Dr. Zebulon Mennell had travelled from London, England, to Hyeres, in the south of France, in the context of an emergency, to come to the aid of one of his most delicate patients, namely, Robert Louis Stevenson, 33 years of age, 5 feet, 10 inches tall and weighing in around 104 pounds. Mennell later confided to W.E. Henley, one of the patient’s friends who persuaded him to go there, that he “went out on a forlorn hope; expecting to see another death.”

Mennell arrived at his destination on May 7, 1884, to diagnose RLS about four days after the most violent and dangerous lung hemorrhaging the invalid author from Scotland had experienced to date. “Bloody Jack” was Stevenson’s name for this life-threatening condition which stalked him right up to the day he died on Dec. 3, 1894.

Dr. Mennell spent about a week with his patient and did what he needed to do to return to England with a clear conscience. On his way out, he gave some parting advice, that RLS should leave Hyeres immediately to go to another resort town, Royat, at a higher altitude. “Immediately” took about three weeks to accomplish. In a letter to his mother, Louis described his most recent and disturbing near-death experience: “This is of course a crisis in the poor annals of my invalidery. I must continue to avoid hemorrhage, and say some, I must live the life of a delicate girl till I am forty.”

There seems to be confusion among the galaxy of Stevenson biographies pertaining to his motive for leaving Hyeres after 15 months of residence there. Some accounts say that there was a report of an outbreak of cholera in the region as a good reason to leave, but having no mention of Dr. Mennell’s advice to go to Royat. But the published letters of RLS that mention Mennell don’t mention an epidemic. It doesn’t matter. What does matter is that Royat seemed to be a good idea, at first. There, Mr. and Mrs. R.L. Stevenson, their traveling servant Valentine Roch and Bogue, their Skye terrier, got a hotel. To his parents, Louis writes, “My dear people, Considerable success but great cold at Royat. However, the Hill air has strung me up. We have rooms, and were charmingly received by Brandt” — Dr. Brandt, that is, next physician in line to treat RLS.

Royat would not be a great place to remember for the Stevenson expedition. Much of the time there, they were all sick. On June 22, Louis writes his parents again: “If we have been bad correspondents, you must make some allowance for us. I am still in bed by reason of bad weather. Fanny has been very seedy indeed and is in bed since near a week. To crown our tribulations, Valentine and Coggie both took to bed; and we had to reemploy the courier who was still luckily disengaged … the summer passes, and I do not get out. It is annoying. Ever affectionate son — R.L.S.”

An afterthought: “We think we shall come to England. Since the above was written we have decided, subject to Mennell’s opinion … we would start in about a week’s time or ten days, come to London … both get overhauled by the profession (doctors) and be ready to go where we think best when Lloyd’s holidays begin.” Lloyd Osbourne, Stevenson’s stepson, now 16, was attending school in Bournemouth, when all this was happening.

Following the arrival of Mr. and Mrs. RLS and Valentine and Bogue in England, and a reunion with the parents, the migrants moved on to Bournemouth to hook up with Lloyd and come up with a plan. They soon discovered that they were already in a resort town with a good reputation as the best place in England to be, if you had TB, that is tuberculosis, which Stevenson and his circle still presumed was Bloody Jack’s enabler, though it was not.

Midway along the English Channel coast, consumptives had found good reasons to settle in Bournemouth for a generation: things like fresh sea air, mild temperatures and evergreen woods. There was money, too, for the place attracted prosperous, retired types, people like generals, admirals, upper civil servants and rich widows. They built extravagant villas called “Cathay” or “Lorna Doone.” By autumn 1884, Bournemouth was chosen to be the next permanent home for the Stevenson expedition, at least for a while. Stevenson’s parents supported the decision and spent time there themselves.

Thomas was slowly losing it. A lifetime of doing the kind of work he did, civil engineering lighthouses and harborworks into existence, had taken its toll. You would have to read a book like “The Lighthouse Stevensons,” by Bella Bathhurst, to get some notion of the extreme conditions in which such work was done in the early 19th century. Thomas had taken quite a liking to his daughter-in-law Fanny, the same woman whom he used to think was an agent of Satan, sent to ruin his son. “This mad, sinful business” is what Thomas had called his son’s apparent infatuation with Fanny in 1879, when Louis took off on his quest to the American West to find and marry Mrs. Fanny Osbourne. Now Thomas treated Fanny more like a daughter and would tell her things he would not even tell his only son. To demonstrate his appreciation of Fanny and confidence in her, Thomas offered to buy them a house in Fanny’s name, plus 500 pounds to furnish it.

Fanny set out real estate hunting and discovered a villa called Sea View by the retired naval officer who was selling it. Made of two stories of yellow brick with a blue slate roof, it had seclusion with an acre or so of garden for a back yard ending at a chalk cliff and a close-up view of the English Channel. There were few neighbors because the neighborhood called Westbourne, was just beginning to develop. Sea View will do, decided Fanny. Louis liked it, too. The hypocrisy of it all seems to have been invigorating to this hardcore bohemian from Fontainebleau, now moving into a symbol of bourgeoisification and liking it. For Louis, the centerpiece of his new place would be what they called a drawing room. “Our drawing room is a place so beautiful that it’s like eating to sit in it. No other room is so lovely in the world; there I sit like an old Irish beggar-man in a palace throne-room. Incongruity never went so far.”

Mr. and Mrs. Stevenson could not move into Sea View right away. In the meantime, Fanny returned to Hyeres to ship their belongings to their new address while Louis decided that he didn’t like the name the place came with. He would have to come up with something different.