Medicine in 1815 : an exhibition to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the end of the Napoleonic wars, 15 April to 31 December, 1965.

  • Wellcome Historical Medical Museum and Library
Date:
[1965]
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: Medicine in 1815 : an exhibition to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the end of the Napoleonic wars, 15 April to 31 December, 1965. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    155. Contemporary Bills reporting mine disasters : 1. A Full Account of the Dreadful Disaster which happened on June 19th 1823 at Walker Colliery . . . Newcastle. Broadside. Printed by Wm. Stephenson, Gateshead. 2. The Miner's Petition from West Bromwich. In verse. One stanza reads : Then help it is call'd for, by all who surround, To see where their mangled bodies can be found; Some crush'd all to pieces—their brains fly around! Then pity poor Colliers that work under ground. 3. Dreadful Explosion in a Pit called No. 1 Pit, near Washing- ton in the County of Durham on Thursday last, Nov. 20, 1828. ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY 156. John Abernethy. An Enquiry into the Probability and Rationality of Mr. Hunter's Theory of Life. London, 1814. Abernethy succeeded Sir William Blizard as professor of anatomy and surgery at the Royal College of Surgeons and this book contains the text of his first two lectures. A medical critic wrote that it was 'too much tainted with medical reasoning for a surgeon.' The theory may be seen in these two quotations : 'Mr. Hunter . . . patiently and accurately examined the different links of this great chain [of living beings], which seems to connect even man with the common matter of the universe.' (p. 17) and 'The experiments of Sir Humphry Davy seem to me to form an important link in the connexion of our knowledge of dead and living matter. He has solved the great and long hidden mystery of chemical attraction.' (p. 48). 157. Sir Everard Home (1756-1832). Lectures on Comparative Anatomy; in which are explained the Preparations in the Hunterian Collection. 2 vols. London, 1814. This work eventually extended to 6 volumes, the last being pub- lished in 1828. A pupil of John Hunter, Home was first keeper of the Hunterian Collections and destroyed Hunter's MSS. after utilising them in his publications. He was surgeon to St. George's Hospital 1793-1827 and first President of the Royal College of Surgeons.