The American College of Surgeons was initiated in 1913 by Chicago Surgeon, Franklin Martin, following a series of successful clinical congresses attended by American surgeons in 1911 (Philedelphia) and 1912 (New York). The American College of Surgeons is a scientific and educational association of surgeons that aims to improve the quality of care for the surgical patient by setting high standards for surgical education and practice.
George Cuthbert Adeney was born in 1879. He was educated at Merchant Taylors' School and St Thomas' Hospital, where he was house physician and clinical assistant in the throat department. He obtained MRCS in 1903, and FRCS in 1911. During World War One he served in the Royal Army Medical Corps with the rank of Major. He became medical officer for the Ministry of Health in c 1928. Subsequently he was regional medical officer for the Ministry at Norwich. He was also a member of the Medical Society for Individual (Alderian) Psychology. He died in 1958.
Bernhard Siegfried Albinus was born in 1697. He was the son of Bernhard Albinus (1653-1721), Professor of Medicine at the University of Leiden. He was educated in Leiden and briefly in Paris and became Professor of Anatomy and Surgery in Leiden in 1721. He published an edition of the complete works of Vesalius in 1725, and the artist Jan Wandelaar (1690-1759), engraved the plates. Albinus and Wandelaar worked together for over 30 years, and their best-known work was the Tabulae sceleti et musculorum corporis humani, published in 1747. Albinus remained at the University of Leiden until his death in 1770.
Samuel Dodd Clippingdale received his medical education at the University of Aberdeen and at the London Hospital, where he was Surgical Scholar and House Physician. He was Surgeon to the Kensington Dispensary and Children's Hospital, and Police Surgeon for Kensington. He was elected President of the West London Medico-Chirurgical Society and Vice-President of the Section of Balneology and Climatology of the Royal Society of Medicine. He died in 1925.
William Cullen was born in Hamilton, Lanarkshire, in 1710. He was educated at Glasgow University before moving to London. He became a surgeon on a merchant ship travelling to the West Indies, in 1729. He returned to London in 1730, and assisted an apothecary, before returning to Scotland in c 1732. He went on to study under Alexander Monro, primus, at Edinburgh Medical School in 1734-1736. He began to practice as a surgeon in Hamilton, in 1736. William Hunter was his resident pupil from 1737-1740. Cullen graduated from Glasgow in 1740. He was appointed Professor of Medicine at Glasgow University, in 1751, and Professor of Chemistry at Edinburgh Medical School, in 1756. Cullen was President of Edinburgh College of Physicians from 1773-1775, and was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of London, in 1777. He died in 1790.
Edward Charles Hulme was born in London, in 1821. He was educated in London, where he was so severely burned by a squib which he was carrying in his pocket that he was an invalid for two years. After further instruction from a tutor he was apprenticed to an apothecary at Totnes, his father having bought property at Stoke Gabriel on the river Dart. He entered St. Bartholomew's Hospital, and in 1840 was appointed Student in Human and Comparative Anatomy of the Royal College of Surgeons. He had a practice at 19 Gower Street, and was for a time Surgeon to the Blenheim Street Free Dispensary, then to the Central London Ophthalmic Hospital, to the Great Northern Hospital, and Medical Examiner to the Marine Society. He died in 1900.
George Robert Skinner was born in 1825, son of George Skinner, surgeon of Walcot, Somerset. He received the MRCS in 1847, and the FRCS in 1852. He was a Student in Comparative Anatomy at the Royal College of Surgeons, 1849-1851. He joined the Bengal Army as Assistant Surgeon, in 1852. He died in Bath, in 1856, aged 30.
Currently no biographical information on Sydney Humphryes is known.
Biographical information was unknown at the time of compilation.
Sir Harry Platt was born in Thornham, Lancashire, in 1886. At the age of five he developed tuberculosis of the knee. He was educated in classics and languages by home tutors. He graduated MB BS (London) from the University of Manchester in 1909, with a distinction in medicine and the gold medal in surgery. He obtained his FRCS in 1912 and was appointed resident surgical officer in the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital, London. During World War One, due to his knee disability, he was made a captain in the Royal Army Medical Corps Territorial Forces, in charge of the Military Orthopaedic Centre in Manchester. He joined the staff of the Shropshire Orthopaedic Hospital in Oswestry in 1920. He became surgical director of the Ethel Hedley Hospital in Windermere; consultant to the Lancashire county council for education, public health, and tuberculosis; and a lecturer in orthopaedic surgery to the University of Manchester. The Manchester Royal Infirmary established an orthopaedic department away from the control of general surgery and Platt transferred there in 1932. Manchester University recognized his outstanding academic contribution to orthopaedics by creating a personal chair for him in 1939, which he held until 1951. Having helped found the British Orthopaedic Association in 1917, Platt became its President (1934-1935). He was also President of the Royal Society of Medicine orthopaedics section in 1931-1932 and British delegate (1929-1948) and later President (1948-1953) of the international committee of the Société Internationale de Chirurgie Orthopédique et de Traumatologie. He served on the council of the Royal College of Surgeons of England (1940-1958) and was its President in 1954-1957. He was knighted in 1948 because of this work. He was consultant adviser in orthopaedic surgery to the Ministry of Health (1940-1963), organising general orthopaedics and special fracture and peripheral nerve injury centres as well as being honorary civilian consultant to the Army Medical Services (1942-1954). Platt was actively involved in setting up the National Health Service before and after 1948. In 1958 Platt was made a baronet, as was then customary for Presidents of the Royal College of Surgeons. He received six honorary degrees and held sixteen honorary memberships of various societies and eight honorary fellowships of surgical colleges. Up to 1982 he wrote prolifically on orthopaedic subjects-their history, organisation, staffing, nursing, and education. He died in 1986.
Percivall Pott was born in London, in 1714. He was educated at a private school in Darenth, Kent. He became apprenticed to Edward Nourse in 1729, preparing dissections for demonstration at Nourse's anatomy and surgery lectures. Pott built a good professional reputation, and received the freedom of the Barber-Surgeons' Company in 1736, and also passed the grand diploma examination, without actually being in attendance. Pott was appointed assistant surgeon to St Bartholomew's Hospital in 1745, and became full surgeon in 1749. He challenged some long established treatments, for example the use of hot iron cauteries. Pott and William Hunter were elected the first lecturers in anatomy to the new Surgeon's company, in 1753. Pott became a member of the court of examiners in 1763, and master of the company in 1765. He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1764. He had a large practice, with patients including David Garrick, Samuel Johnson, and Thomas Gainsborough. He was made honorary Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh in 1786, and an honorary member of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland in 1787. He resigned from St Bartholomew's Hospital aged 73, was made a hospital governor and continued in private practice until his death in 1788.
John Thomas Woolhouse was born in Halstead, Essex, in 1666. Son of Thomas Woolhouse, royal oculist and of the third generation, according to Woolhouse, to have followed that profession. He was educated at Westminster School and matriculated in 1684 at Trinity College, Cambridge, on a scholarship. He graduated in 1686/7 and then travelled throughout Europe to familiarise himself with the various methods of treating diseases of the eye. He started a practice in London, and served for a time as Groom of the Chamber to King James II. He was working in Paris from before 1700 to about 1730. He served as surgeon to the Hospice des Quinze-Vingts in 1711. He originated the operation of iridectomy to restore sight in cases of occluded pupil, and he was the first to describe the complete and systematic extirpation of the lachrymeal sac when the duct was blocked. He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Surgeons of England, in 1721, being at that time oculist to the French King. He was also a member of the Royal Academy of Berlin and of the Institute of Sciences of Bologna. He died in 1734.
Thomas Howitt, was the son of Thomas Howitt (1785-1846), and followed his father in general practice at Lancaster. Howitt became MRCS in 1831, and in the same year became a Licentiate of the Society of Apothecaries. He was elected FRCS in 1853. Howitt was dresser to Sir Charles Bell at Middlesex Hospital in 1830 and in 1832 visited Paris and studied French Hospital Practice, particularly the technique of Baron Dupuytren. He was Surgeon, and afterwards Consulting Surgeon, to the Lancaster Infirmary, Surgeon to the Lancaster Yeomanry, and Justice of the Peace for Lancaster. He died in 1886 or 1887.
No biographical information was available at the time of compilation.
John Sagittary (fl 1690) lived in Blandford, and qualified as an MD in Oxford.
No biographical information was available at the time of compilation.
In the late 18th century, John Hooper attended comparative anatomy lectures by Henry Cline (1750-1827); midwifery lectures by William Lowder (fl 1778-1801); and clinical lectures by William Saunders (1743-1817).
John Ramsbotham received the diploma of Membership of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1790. He practised in Wakefield, where he kept notes of this clinical practice. He moved to London in 1806, and became a popular lecturer of midwifery. He published a book titled Practical Observations in Midwifery in 1821. A further edition in two volumes was published in 1832, and a second revised edition in 1842. He was last entered as a member of the Royal College of Surgeons in the Membership Lists in 1844.
Alexander Ramsay was born in 1754. He studied medicine at Edinburgh University, and obtained his medical degree from St Andrews. He was an anatomist, who founded a school of anatomy at Fryeburg, Maine, and gave lectures in America and England to support the school. He studied rattlesnake venom, and a snake bite could have been the cause of his death in 1824.
George Beckett Batten was born in India in 1860. He studied at Edinburgh University and obtained his Bachelor of Medicine and Master of Surgery in 1884, and the MD in 1887. He went on to study for a DMRE (Diploma in Medicine, Radiology and Electrology) at Cambridge in 1921. In World War One he was Surgeon in charge of the X-ray department at Southwark Military Hospital. During his career he was Honorary Radiologist, the Children's Hospital Sydenham; Senior Medical Officer, East Dulwich Providential Dispensary; Assistant Medical Officer, Fife and Kinross District Asylum; and Honorary Surgeon and Ophthalmology Assistant, Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh. He was a member of the British Institute of Radiology; member and former president of the Rontgen Society; Fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine; and a member of the British Medical Association. Batten was amongst the first to work in Radiotherapy, and his daughter, Dr Grace Batten (MRCS) was also a Radiologist. He died in 1942.
Mr Gardiner attended lectures by Joseph Else, Hugh Smith MD and Thomas Denman, from 1774-1775. Further biographical information is currently unavailable.
John Lizars Lizars was a Student in Anatomy at the Royal College of Surgeons of England from 1853-1855. No other biographical information is available.
Henry Robert Silvester was born in 1829. He was a Student in Human and Comparative Anatomy at the Royal College of Surgeons of England from 1855-1856. He attended King's College London and became a Member of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1853. He became Doctor of Medicine in 1855, from the University of London. He worked as an associate at King's College and as consulting physician to the Clapham General Dispensary. He was Medical Assistant to the Royal Humane Society and received the golden Fothergill medal in 1883. Silvester invented hypodermic inflation, a method for making men and animals unsinkable.
Sir (Harold Arthur) Thomas Fairbank was born in 1876. He was educated at Epsorn College and gained an open scholarship to Charing Cross Hospital. He qualified in 1898 as a doctor and in 1899 as a dentist but, after a house surgeon's appointment at Charing Cross, he volunteered for the South African war and was at Lord Robert's camp at Paardeberg when Cronje surrendered. On his return to England, after achieving his higher surgical qualifications he was appointed resident superintendent at Great Ormond Street Hospital, and became surgical registrar. He was then appointed orthopaedic surgeon to Charing Cross, the first appointment of its kind in London, and also to Great Ormond Street, where his particular study was of congenital dislocation of the hip. In 1914 he visited orthopaedic centres in New York and Boston but, as the holder of a commission in the RAMC (TF), he was mobilised with the 85th Field Ambulance and proceeded to Belgium and France, mostly in the vicinity of Ypres. Later his unit was moved to Macedonia to serve in the Struma valley, and he was appointed consulting surgeon to the British Salonika Force, being awarded the DSO and OBE, and being three times mentioned in dispatches. On returning to England he was invited to take charge of an orthopaedic department at King's College Hospital and to act as consultant orthopaedic surgeon to King Edward VII Hospital for Officers and to the Treloar Hospital at Acton. He was an honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine and President of its Orthopaedic and Children's sections. As President of the British Orthopaedic Association he was invited to give the Lady Jones Lecture at Liverpool in 1929, and was Robert Jones lecturer at the College in 1938; he was made an honorary MCh(Orth) Liverpool in 1939. On the outbreak of the Second World War he was appointed consultant adviser in orthopaedic surgery to the Ministry of Health, and he was knighted for his services. He died in 1961.
The Institute of Laryngology and Otology (ILO) was established on the Gray's Inn Road site in 1946 as one of the Federated Postgraduate Institutes of the University of London. These Institutes were set up to undertake specialised research, teaching and training and were associated with the appropriate specialist hospitals. The Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear Hospital (RNTNE) was the companion hospital for the ILO. In Aug 1987 the ILO was incorporated into University College London (UCL), although the name was protected by statute. The incorporation brought significant advances in terms of co-operation with other departments in UCL but changed the status from independently funded Postgraduate Medical Institute to that of a university department with quite different funding strategies.
Gotthelf Fischer von Waldheim was born in Waldheim, Germany, in 1771. He was educated at the University of Leipzig, graduating as Doctor of Medicine in 1798. He was Professor of Natural History, and Librarian at the Central School Mayence from 1799-1803. From 1803 he was Professor and Director of the Museum of Natural History, Moscow, Russia, and was the founder of the Society of Naturalists Moscow in 1808. He died in 1853.
The London Society of Thoracic Surgeons, known as 'Charlie's Club', held it's first meeting on 2 May 1952. The Club was formed for thoracic surgeons to meet annually and report to each other on their mistakes in order to learn from them. The first 'Charlie' or mistake was made by Mr J R Belcher, three years before the first meeting of Charlie's Club. Belcher inadvertently divided the left main bronchus during a lobectomy, and subsequently published a report. The original constitution stated that there should be 15 members of the Club, although this was later extended to 18. The Club met once a year with one member acting as Chairman each year. The original aim was that each member would bring his 2 worst mistakes of the previous year to present at the meeting. Projects for each year were set, and the members would collect statistics on a particular theme, which would then be presented at the meeting, and the results possibly published. The Chairman would usually write the paper for his year in the chair. In 1980, following a fall in attendance, the Club decided that it had reached an end. The last scientific meeting of Charlie's Club took place at St Bartholomew's Hospital on the 1 May 1981. It was decided however that the Charlie's Club Annual Dinner should be continued as a social event for the members. The annual dinners continued for 12 years, the last dinner being held at the Army and Navy Club on 7 May 1992, the 40th anniversary of the Club.
Charles Ferdinand Keele studied medicine at St Thomas's Hospital, becoming a Member of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, and a Licentiate of the Society of Apothecaries in 1860. Keele's career history included Surgeon to the Royal West India Mail SP Service, House Surgeon and Secretary to the Royal Portsmouth, Portsea and Gosport Hospital, Surgeon to the Jewish Society, and Surgeon to Magdalen Hospital. He is last entered in the Medical Directories in 1929.
Andrew Francis Jackson was born in Concepción, Chile, in 1880, of Scottish and American parents. After completing his early education in American schools in Concepción and Santiago, he travelled to the United States in 1901 to enter the School of Dentistry at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. He graduated in 1904 and entered practice, first in Camden, New Jersey, and then in downtown Philadelphia. He was also a demonstrator in operative dentistry at the University of Pennsylvania Dental School from 1906-1908. He read the Tomes Lectures at the Royal College of Surgeons of London in 1948, and was made a Fellow in Dentistry. He retired in 1962. He died in 1968. Posthumously, Jackson was awarded the Albert H Ketcham Memorial Award for 1964.
George Fordyce was born in Aberdeen in 1736. He was educated in Fouran, and the University of Aberdeen, where he was created Master of Arts at the age of 14. He began training in medicine with his uncle, Dr John Fordyce who practiced at Uppingham. He then went on to study medicine at the University of Edinburgh in 1755 and obtained his Doctor of Medicine in 1758. Fordyce then travelled to London and studied anatomy under Dr William Hunter, and also studied botany at the Chelsea gardens. Fordyce also studied anatomy under Albinus at Leiden in 1759. Upon returning to London, he started a course of lectures on chemistry in 1759, and then added to this courses on materia medica and the practice of physic in 1764. He continued to teach these lectures for nearly thirty years. He became a Licentiate of the College of Physicians in 1765, and was Physician to St Thomas's Hospital from 1770-1802. He was made a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1776, and a 'speciali gratia' fellow of the College of Physicians in 1787. He played an important part in compiling the new Pharmacopeia Londinensis, issued in 1788. He was Censor for the Royal College of Physicians in 1787, 1792, and 1800; Gulstonian Lecturer in 1789; and Harveian Orator in 1791. He died in 1802.
Herbert Markant Page studied to be a doctor of medicine at Brussels in 1882. He had become a Member of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1873 and a Licentiate of the Society of Apothecaries in 1874. He had also studied Public Health at Cambridge in 1879. His career history included Resident Medical Assistant at the General Hospital, Birmingham; Medical Officer of Health at Redditch Unitary District; and Honorary Surgeon at Smallwood Hospital. He was a member of the British Medical Association; the Somerset Archaeology and Natural History Society; and the Royal Sanitary Institute. He was also a fellow of the Royal Institute of Public Health.
Golding Bird was born at Downham, Norfolk in 1814. He was educated at private school and apprenticed to William Pretty, an apothecary in London from 1829-1833. He was a medical student at Guy's Hospital from 1832, where he excelled, achieving the Apothecaries' Company medal for botany and attracting the attention of Addison and Sir Astley Cooper. He assisted Sir Astley Cooper with his work on diseases of the breast. He was licensed to practise by Apothecaries' Hall in 1836. Bird obtained his MD from St Andrews University in 1838, and his MA in 1840. Bird was a lecturer on natural philosophy at Guy's Hospital from 1836-1853, and also a lecturer on medical botany and on urinary pathology. He was physician to the Finsbury Dispensary in 1836. He became a licentiate of the College of Physicians of London in 1840, and a Fellow of the College of Physicians in 1845. He was an assistant physician at Guy's Hospital, and a joint lecturer on materia medica at Guy's Hospital Medical School from 1843-1853. He lectured on materia medica at the College of Physicians in 1847 to 1849. He was a member of the Linnaean and Geological Societies, and a Fellow of the Royal Society. He died in 1854.
Cuthbert Hilton Golding-Bird was born in Myddleton Square, Pentonville, London in 1848, the second son of Golding Bird, MD, FRS. Golding-Bird was educated at Tonbridge School from 1856-1862, and afterwards at King's College School in the Strand and at King's College. He graduated BA at the University of London in 1867, and Won the gold medal in forensic medicine at the MB examination in 1873. Entering the medical school of Guy's Hospital in 1868 he received the first prize for first year students in 1869, the first prize for third year students and the Treasurer's medals for surgery and for medicine in 1873. For a short time he acted as demonstrator of anatomy at Guy's, but on his return from a visit to Paris he was elected assistant surgeon in 1875 and demonstrator of physiology. He held the office of surgeon until 1908, until he resigned at the age of 60, and was made consulting surgeon. At the Royal College of Surgeons Golding-Bird was an examiner in elementary physiology 1884-1886, in physiology 1886-1891, in anatomy and physiology for the Fellowship 1884-1890 and 1892-1895. He was on the Dental Board as Examiner in surgery in 1902, a member of the Court of Examiners 1897-1907, and a member of the Council 1905-1913. He died in 1939.
Biographical information was unavailable at the time of compilation.
Gilbert the Englishman [Gilbertus Anglicus, Gilbertus de Aquila, Gilbert de l'Egle] was the author of Compendium Medicinae, an important medical and surgical work of the Middle Ages. It was originally written in Latin with excerpts translated into New High German, Hebrew, Catalan and Middle English. Little is known for certain about Gilbert's life, and he has been confused with other contemporaries of the same, or similar, name. He is likely to have been the Gilbert del Egle, physician, who witnessed a charter of Hubert Walter, Archbishop of Canterbury, in 1205. He is also likely to have been the Magister Gillbertus del Egle who attended the Archbishop on his deathbed. Other sources suggest that at about that time Gilbert was in the service of Robert de Breteuil, Earl of Leicester (d 1204). He is also thought to have received an ecclesiastical income and may have witnessed a charter as King John's physician, c 1207. The composition of the Compendium, which from his use of Arabic sources indicates he cannot have completed before c 1230-1240, suggests he may have attended a more sophisticated centre of medical and philosophical learning, eg Paris, Montpellier, Salerno, than could be found in England at that time. Gilbert's very early reference of Averroes (Abû 'l-Walîd Muhammad ibn Ahmad ibn Rushd), as well as his association with Gilles de Corbeil and Richard of Wendover, point to his presence at Montpellier. Gilbert's Compendium covers all aspects of medicine and surgery as well as some of religious healing and the use of prayers and charms. It is divided into seven books dealing with fevers, the head, sense organs, organs of respiration, organs of digestion, the humours and in the last book diseases of women as well as advice for travellers, how to light fires and antidotes to poisons.
Trotula of Salerno lived in the 11th or 12th century in Salerno, Southern Italy. She is thought to have occupied the chair of medicine at the School of Salerno. Trotula was one of the most famous physicians of that time, with her main interests in alleviating the suffering of women. Her most notable medical works were Passionibus Mulierum Curandorum (The Diseases of Women), known as Trotula Major, and De Ornatu Mulierum known as Trotula Minor. Trotula Major contains information about menses, conception, pregnancy, childbirth, and general diseases and their treatments. Remedies usually consist of herbs, spices, and oils. The identity of Trotula of Salerno has caused some controversy, with some scholars disputing her existence, or that she was a woman.
Albert Wilson was born in Newcastle-on-Tyne in 1954. He was educated at the Friend's School, York and Edinburgh University where he was awarded the Gold Medal for his thesis on heart diseases. Wilson also visited the Universities of Paris, Vienna, Berlin and St Petersburg. He qualified as a doctor in 1878, becoming a house surgeon at the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary, and resident physician to the Cowgate Dispensary. He moved to London, and after running a city practice, became medical officer at the Walthamstow Branch of the Essex Asylum. He was interested in psychology and more specifically criminal psychology. Wilson served with the French Red Cross during World War One. He died at Fairwarp, near Uckfield, in 1928.
William Rutherford Sanders was born in 1828. He was a Scottish physician. He was lecturer in medicine at the University of Edinburgh in 1853, and was Professor of Pathology from 1869. He was also Physician at the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary. He died in 1881.
John Browne was born in 1642, possibly in Norwich. He studied at St Thomas's Hospital under Thomas Hollyer, and then served as a surgeon in the Navy. He settled at Norwich and in 1677 published his book on tumours. After this he relocated to London, becoming surgeon in ordinary to King Charles II. The King then supported Browne in his application for a post at St Thomas's. After a disagreement with the governers at the hospital the surgeons at St Thomas's, including Browne, were replaced. His appeals for reinstatement were not successful. He continued in the service of the monarchy and was surgeon to William III. His publications included one on the method used by Charles II on touching for the King's Evil, a treatise on wounds, and a treatise on the muscles of the human body published in 1681. This consisted of six lectures illustrated by copper plates. The text of the volume is probably based on William Molins' Myskotomia (1648), and the copper plates are probably based on Giulio Casserio's Tabulae anatomicae LXXIIX (1627).
Sir Charles Alfred Ballance was born in Clapton, Middlesex, in 1856. He was educated at Taunton College under the Rev William Tuckwell, and afterwards in Germany. He entered St Thomas's Hospital where he served as house-surgeon and was for a time demonstrator of anatomy. At the University of London he gained one of the gold medals at the examination for the BS in 1881. He was appointed aural surgeon to St Thomas's Hospital in 1888. He quickly developed the department, practically and scientifically. He was among the first to perform the radical mastoid operation with ligation of the jugular vein and drainage of the lateral sinus. He further improved the operation by lining the cavity in the mastoid with an epithelial graft. He was made assistant surgeon in 1891, and surgeon in 1900. He held office until 1919 when he resigned and was appointed consulting surgeon. He was also elected surgeon to the National Hospital for the Paralysed and Epileptic in Queen Square, Bloomsbury, 1891-1908. He was chief surgeon to the Metropolitan Police, 1912-1926. Having already accepted a commission as captain a la suite, to which he was gazetted in 1908, in the newly formed RAMC branch of the territorial force, Ballance was called up on the outbreak of World War One, and attached to the second London (City) general hospital. He was promoted temporary colonel AMS in 1915 and was ordered to proceed to the Near East. Here he was posted as consulting surgeon at Malta with Sir Charters Symonds, FRCS as his colleague. The two surgeons organised, supervised, and inspired with enthusiasm the large number of emergency hospitals required during the Gallipoli campaign. For his services he was given an honorary MD by the University of Malta, became a Knight of Grace of the Order of St John of Jerusalem, was decorated CB (military) in 1916, and was made a KCMG in 1918. At the Royal College of Surgeons, Ballance was an examiner in anatomy, 1887-1891; a member of the Court of Examiners from 1900-1919; served on the Council, 1910-1926; and was a vice president in 1920. He was Erasmus Wilson lecturer, 1888-1889; Bradshaw lecturer, 1919; Vicary lecturer, 1921; Lister memorial lecturer, 1933, and received the Lister memorial medal for his distinguished contributions to surgical science. Finally he gave the Macewen memorial lecture at Glasgow. He served as President of the Medical Society of London in 1906 and was the first President of the newly founded Society of British Neurological Surgeons in 1927. He only held office for a year, but on resigning he was elected honorary president. He died in 1936.
Sir Herbert Atkinson Barker was born in Southport, in 1869. He was educated in the grammar school at Kirkby Lonsdale, and then visited Canada for his health. On his return he was apprenticed to his cousin, John Atkinson, the bone-setter of Park Lane. Before he was twenty-one Barker set up practice on his own, and was successful in Manchester and Glasgow before he established himself in London. He soon fell foul of the medical profession which does not look kindly on people who practice without having received the traditional education of a teaching hospital, an attitude partly excused by the sincere wish to protect the public from quacks professing to cure disease. However Barker did cure patients, many of whom had failed to obtain relief from qualified doctors. Barker had many journalistic friends, such as R D Blumenfeld, to press his claims, and many of the patients whom he cured were well known in sporting and public life. The controversy reached its height after 1911 when Dr F W Axham was struck off the register for acting as anaesthetist for Barker. This action made Barker more popular with the public, and he gained further sympathy in 1917 when the refusal of his offer to treat soldiers was discussed in Parliament. It was eventually conceded that men might consult an unqualified person on their own responsibility. By this time many eminent people, including leading medical men, were seeking some sort of recognition of Barker's skill. The Archbishop of Canterbury in 1920 was asked to exercise his special powers and bestow on Barker the degree of doctor of medicine. Finally, Barker was knighted in 1922. He retired from regular practice soon afterwards and thereafter spent much of his time on the continent and in the Channel Islands. The animosity of the doctors gradually died down, and in 1936 Barker gave a demonstration of his skill before the British Orthopaedic Association at St Thomas's Hospital. Barker did make a contribution to humanity, not only in relieving suffering but also in stimulating doctors to make more use of this form of therapy. In 1941 he was elected as a manipulative surgeon to Noble's Hospital in the Isle of Man. There had been many bone-setters before Barker, but none attained his eminence. Barker had remarkable success and seemed to have the gift of healing. Experience taught him which patients were unlikely to benefit by his treatment, and his doctor friends were often inundated with patients, mostly incurable, sent to them by Barker. He died in 1950.
No biographical information was available at the time of compilation.
Alexander Walker was born in 1764. He became a cadet in the service of the East India Company in 1780. In 1782 he became an ensign and in the same year took part in campaigns against the forts of Haidar Ali Khan on the Malabar Coast. Walker was also present at Mangalore during the siege by Tipu and its subsequent surrender in 1784. In 1788, after a period in enemy hands, and after taking part in an expedition to the north-west coast of America undertaken by the Bombay government, he was made a lieutenant and was sent with the expedition to relieve the Rajah of Travancore in 1790. In 1791, he was an adjutant. On the conclusion of this stage of the war against Tipu, a commission was nominated to regulate the affairs of Malabar, and Walker was appointed as an assistant. On the arrival in Malabar of General James Stuart (d 1793), commander-in-chief of the army in Bombay, he became his military secretary. In 1797, Walker was made captain, and the same year he became quartermaster-general of the Bombay army with the rank of major. In 1799, he took part in the last war against Tipu and was present at the fighting at Seedaseer and at the siege of Seringapatam during which Tipu Sahib was killed. In 1800, Walker was sent to the Mahratta states with the intention of pacifying and reforming the region and the Mahratta confederacy. Discontent in Baroda culminated in the insurrection of Mulhar Rao in 1801, though this was put down by 1802. In June 1803, Walker was appointed political resident at Baroda and he succeeded in establishing an orderly administration there. His career continued in India, and he attained the rank of lieutenant-general in 1808. In 1810 he returned to Britain, doubtless to his estate of Bowland in Edinburgh and Selkirk, and he retired from service in 1812. Ten years later in 1822 he was called back from his retirement to the government of St. Helena which was under the administration of the East India Company. There he had the rank of brigadier-general. While in St Helena, he improved the island's agriculture and horticulture. Brigadier-General Alexander Walker died in Edinburgh, in 1831.
Sir Cecil Pembrey Grey Wakeley was born near Rainham, Kent, in 1892. He started attending King's School, Rochester in 1904, later attending Dulwich College, and King's College Hospital in 1910. He qualified in 1915 and joined the Royal Navy for the next four years as Surgeon-Lieutenant, spending most of his time aboard the hospital ship Garth Castle at Scapa Flow. His link with the Navy lasted all his life, first as a consultant and in World War Two as Surgeon Rear-Admiral when he worked at the Royal Naval Hospital, Haslar. He was appointed to the staff at King's in 1922, and was senior surgeon by the age of 41, remaining so for the next quarter of a century. He was consultant to the Belgrave Hospital for Children, the Royal Masonic and the Maida Vale Hospital for Nervous Diseases. In addition he was a member of Council of the College and eventually President from 1949-1954. This was a period of immense importance since it witnessed the completion of the College's very ambitious rebuilding programme, the establishment of the Faculties of Dental Surgery and Anaesthesia, and the setting up of the academic units and their laboratories. He was also President of the Association of Physiotherapy, Hunterian Society, Medical Society of London and the Royal Life Saving Society. He examined for both the Primary and Final Fellowship examinations as well as the medical degrees at many universities in the UK and overseas. He was also a Hunterian Orator, Hunterian Professor five times and Erasmus Wilson, Bradshaw, and Thomas Vicary Lecturer. He was Chairman of the Trustees of the Hunterian Collection and received the College's Gold Medal for his services. For twenty years he edited the British Journal of Surgery and in 1947 he founded the Annals of the Royal College of Surgeons of England which he continued to edit until 1969. He was for a long time editor of the now defunct Medical Press and Circular.
The Artificial Limb Centre was set up in 1948 as part of Command Hospital, an Indian Army Hospital in Poona (now Pune), India. The centre is one of the oldest and largest of its kind in India.
No biographical information relating to Lieutenant General B Hawkins was available at the time of compilation.
The Krishnarajendra Hospital was opened in Mysore (now Mysuru), India, in 1876. It was re-constructed in 1918 with accomodation for 250 in-patients. The hospital aimed to offer free treatment for the poor, regardless of caste, creed or colour. An out-patient department endowed by Hajee Sier Ismail Sait was opened in 1928. An Eye Department and a Children's Ward were opened in 1934. By 2004 the hospital was a Tertiary Referral Centre and Teaching Hospital attached to Mysore Medical College. The hospital has a total bed capacity of around 1330 beds.
The Mysore University Medical College was established first at Bangalore in 1924, and moved to new buildings at Mysore (now Mysuru) in 1930. In the 1930s, some graduates of the College went on to become Members of the Royal College of Physicians (London) and the Royal College of Surgeons of England. Some went on to further study and practice in the United States of America, and others stayed to practice in India. The College is attached to the teaching hospitals, Krishnarajendra Hospital and Cheluvamba Hospital.
No biographical information relating to G Shankar was available at the time of compilation.
Thomas Hamilton was a surgeon in Glasgow, and was Professor of Anatomy and Botany at the University of Glasgow. He retired in 1781 and died in 1782. His son was William Hamilton.
William Hamilton was born in Glasgow, in 1758. His father was Thomas Hamilton, a surgeon, and Professor of Anatomy and Botany at Glasgow University. William Hamilton studied his MA in 1775. He then studied medicine at Edinburgh under William Cullen and Joseph Black, although returned to Glasgow early due to his father's ill health. William Hamilton continued his studies in London under William Hunter. He then returned to assist his father in his lectures, and in 1781 was nominated as his father's successor in the professorship. After the death of his father in 1782, William was left with a successful practice. He died in 1790. He had two sons, William and Thomas.
John Hunter was an anatomist and surgeon working in London until his death in 1793. Please see MS0189 for a biographical account.
William Irvine was born in Glasgow in 1743. He worked as a chemist in Scotland and was assistant to Joseph Black. He died in 1787.
John Campbell was 4th Earl of Loudoun, a British nobleman and military leader, born in 1705. He was the great grandson of Sir John Campbell, who was created 1st Earl of Loudoun in 1637. He apparently paid a great deal of attention to detail, a characteristic that made him often late to many battles. Lord Loudoun was not a very successful military leader and many of his regiments were lost in battles. He was sent to North America, where he is said to have ignored the advice of the local colonials like George Washington, who anticipated the onslaught of French and Indians, and did nothing to strengthen the remaining western forts. He was generally considered incompetent, arrogant and tyrannical. He died in 1782.
Joseph Pearce was from Newbury, as noted at the front of his notes of John Hunter's lectures. No further biographical information was available at the time of compilation.
Thomas Wilson, of the Oaks, Tenterden, Kent, was a medical student at one of the London Hospitals in the late 18th century. A note at the front of the volume states that he had two daughters who died unmarried, and a brother, Edward Wilson, DD.
Matthew Baillie was born in Shotts manse, Lanarkshire, in 1761. He was the son of James Baillie (c 1722-1778) and his wife, Dorothea (c 1721-1806). They also had two daughters, the younger was Joanna Baillie the poet. Dorothea Baillie's father was John Hunter of Long Calderwood, near East Kilbride, Lanarkshire; and her brothers were the anatomists William Hunter and John Hunter. Matthew Baillie was educated at the English school in Hamilton, 1766-1768; the Latin school in Hamilton, 1768-1774; and at the University of Glasgow, 1774-1779. He matriculated at Oxford in 1779. He went to live with his uncle, William Hunter, in London in 1780. He still attended Oxford, and graduated BA in 1783, and MA in 1786. He attended dissections and lectures at William Hunter's anatomy school and museum in Great Windmill Street. He also went to courses in chemistry, medicine, surgery, and obstetrics given by his uncle John Hunter; George Fordyce; Thomas Denman; and William Osborne. When William Hunter died in 1783 he left Baillie in control of the anatomy school, the freehold of the premises, thirty years' use of the museum, and about £5000. The small Hunter family estate of Long Calderwood also passed to Baillie, but he renounced it in favour of John Hunter. Baillie soon became an anatomy lecturer at Great Windmill Street, working in increasingly uneasy partnership with William Hunter's former partner William Cruikshank, until 1799. He also completed his broader medical training as a pupil at St George's Hospital, where he was appointed physician in 1787. In mid-1788 he made a four-month tour of France, Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, and the Netherlands, visiting many hospitals and anatomy schools, recording critical observations on conditions and techniques. He graduated BM at Oxford in 1786; DM in 1789; and was elected FRCP (London) in 1790. William Hunter's posthumous An Anatomical Description of the Human Gravid Uterus and its Contents (1794) was edited for publication by Baillie. Two papers in Philosophical Transactions in 1788 and 1789 were followed by his election FRS in 1790 (FRSE in 1799); many medical societies gave him the professional accolade of honorary membership. He was Croonian lecturer of the Royal Society (1791), and of the Royal College of Physicians of London (1796-1798), for whom he was also Goulstonian lecturer (1794); he gave the Harveian oration in 1798. In 1805 he was a founder member (and second president, 1808-1810) of the Medical and Chirurgical Society of London, forerunner of the Royal Society of Medicine. Also in 1810 he was appointed physician-extraordinary to George III, visiting the deranged king several hundred times during the regency, and was present at his death in 1820. He was physician-in-ordinary to Princess Charlotte, and had overall responsibility for the management of her confinement in 1817. His brother-in-law, Sir Richard Croft, 6th baronet (1762-1818), was principal accoucheur. Tragically, the child was still-born, and Princess Charlotte died a few hours later. Croft shot himself a few months afterwards probably suffering from depression. Baillie also attended Lord Byron, Sir Walter Scott, and Edward Gibbon, and he examined Samuel Johnson's lungs post mortem. Baillie died in 1823.
John Abernethy was born in Coleman Street, London, in 1764. He was educated at Wolverhampton Grammar school, and at the age of fifteen he was apprenticed to Charles Blicke, surgeon to St Bartholomew's Hospital, London. Abernethy remained at Bart's for the rest of his career, being appointed assistant surgeon in 1787, and promoted to full surgeon in 1815. During the 1790s, Abernethy published several papers on a variety of anatomical topics. On the strength of these contributions he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1796. Between 1814 and 1817 he served as Professor of Anatomy and Surgery at the Royal College of Surgeons. Abernethy also offered private lectures in anatomy in a house in Bartholomew Close, near to the hospital. The governors of Bart's then built a lecture theatre within the hospital to accommodate his classes. In 1824 Thomas Wakley, editor of the newly established journal The Lancet, published Abernethy's lectures without his permission. Abernethy sought an injunction but was unsuccessful, and remained resentful about the incident. Abernethy had himself attended the lectures of John Hunter, with whom he was also personally acquainted, and after Hunter's death he professed himself to be the spokesman for Hunter's physiological and pathological views. He died in 1831.
Peter Mere Latham was born in London, in 1789. He was educated at the free school of Sandbach, Macclesfield grammar school, and Brasenose College, Oxford. He graduated BA (1810) MA (1813), MB (1814), and MD (1816). He was admitted an Inceptor-Candidate of the College of Physicians in 1815; a Candidate in 1817; and a Fellow in 1818. He was Censor in 1820, 1833, and 1837; Gulstonian lecturer in 1819; Lumleian lecturer in 1827 and 1828; Harveian orator in 1839; and was repeatedly placed upon the council. He was physician to the Middlesex Hospital in 1815, and in 1823 was appointed by the government, in conjunction with Dr Roget, to take the medical charge of the inmates of the penitentiary at Millbank, then suffering from an epidemic of scurvy and dysentery. He was then appointed physician to St Bartholomew's Hospital in 1824. He lectured at the Hospital's medical school with Sir George Burrows on the theory and practice of medicine. Later he published some of his lectures titled Lectures on Subjects connected with Clinical Medicine (London, 1836) and Lectures on Diseases of the Heart (2 volumes, London, 1845). Latham left St Bartholomew's in 1841, He retired to Torquay in 1865 and died there in 1875.
John Abernethy was born in Coleman Street, London, in 1764. He was educated at Wolverhampton Grammar school, and at the age of fifteen he was apprenticed to Charles Blicke, surgeon to St Bartholomew's Hospital, London. Abernethy remained at Bart's for the rest of his career, being appointed assistant surgeon in 1787, and promted to full surgeon in 1815. During the 1790s Abernethy published several papers on a variety of anatomical topics. On the strength of these contributions he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1796. Between 1814 and 1817 he served as Professor of Anatomy and Surgery at the Royal College of Surgeons. Abernethy also offered private lectures in anatomy in a house in Bartholomew Close, near to the hospital. The governors of Bart's then built a lecture theatre within the hospital to accommodate his classes. In 1824 Thomas Wakley, editor of the newly established journal The Lancet, published Abernethy's lectures without his permission. Abernethy sought an injunction but was unsuccessful, and remained resentful about the incident. Abernethy had himself attended the lectures of John Hunter, with whom he was also personally acquainted, and after Hunter's death he professed himself to be the spokesman for Hunter's physiological and pathological views. He died in 1831.
Anthony Holbrow studied at St Bartholomew's Hospital, and practised at Stonehouse, Gloucestershire. He became a Licentiate of the Society of Apothecaries in 1818, MRCS in 1819, and FRCS in 1862. He died in 1873.
William Cheselden was born in Somerby, Leicestershire, in 1688. He probably attended the free grammar school in Leicester. In 1703 Cheselden became apprenticed for 7 years with James Ferne, surgeon in London. He also studied anatomy under William Cowper. He completed his apprenticeship, and passed the final examination of the Barber-Surgeons' Company in 1711. He started a successful course of thirty-five lectures on anatomy, comparative anatomy, and animal economy (physiology), combined with indications for surgical operations, publishing the syllabus in 1711. He was appointed assistant surgeon at St Thomas's Hospital in 1718, and was made a principal surgeon within a year, enabling him to develop his own operative techniques, especially for bladder stone extraction. He was also appointed surgeon for the stone at the Westminster Infirmary and St George's Hospital. His methods had a good record of success. He was made Fellow of the Royal Society in 1711. His reports in the Transactions of the Royal Society included an examination of a skeleton in a Roman Urn at St Albans in 1712, and the restoration of sight in a thirteen year old boy in 1728. Cheselsden, as well as being known for successful lithotomies, was also well known as an eye surgeon. He was appointed surgeon to Queen Caroline in 1727. He resigned his hospital appointments in 1737, to take up the post of resident surgeon in the Royal Hospital, Chelsea. Cheselden was involved in the negotiations towards the separation of surgeons from barbers. He was admitted to the court of assistants of the Barber-Surgeon's Company in 1739, he became an examiner in surgery and by 1744 was renter warden. In 1745 the Company of Surgeons was established with John Ranby as master and Cheselden as senior warden. He died in 1752.