Fonds shows, partially, Francis John Shepherd's activities as a medical student, an author and a dean. It contains his manuscript student notebook on Materia Medica, an admission card to the University Lying-In Hospital and correspondence with among others John George Adami who writes about his leave at Chicago and Harvey Cushing about Sir William Osler.

Fonds consists of a scrapbook of clippings of Shepherd’s articles, reviews, editorials and letters to the editor of medical journals (1869-1929), clipped obituaries from the British Medical Journal and a fragmentary autobiography to 1875. Biographical or autobiographical notes and a report on a visit to European medical schools in 1887 were probably compiled by Shepherd (ca 1920-1924) as they are written on the backs of his incoming personal letters.