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Arthur Gamgee

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Arthur Gamgee
Portrait. Credit: Wellcome Collection
Born(1841-10-11)11 October 1841
Died29 May 1909(1909-05-29) (aged 67)
Paris, France
Resting placeArnos Vale Cemetery, Bristol, England
51°26′06″N 2°33′54″W / 51.435°N 2.565°W / 51.435; -2.565
NationalityBritish
EducationUniversity College School
Alma materUniversity of Edinburgh
OccupationPhysiologist
Known forFounder of the Edinburgh Veterinary Review
Title
SpouseMary Louisa Clark (1875–1909)
ChildrenOne son, two daughters
Parent(s)Joseph Gamgee
Mary Ann West
Relatives

Prof Arthur Gamgee FRS FRSE (11 October 1841 – 29 May 1909)[2] was a British biochemist.[3]

Life

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Arthur Gamgee was the youngest of eight children of Joseph Gamgee, an Edinburgh-born veterinarian and pathologist and his wife Mary Ann West. He was born in Florence, Grand Duchy of Tuscany, where his father had a practice nearby in Livorno. His family moved to the United Kingdom when he was fourteen years old. He was educated at University College School in London and at the University of Edinburgh, graduating with an MD[4] in 1862. For his thesis, Contributions to the Chemistry and Physiology of Foetal Nutrition, he was awarded a gold medal. He did postgraduate studies in both Heidelberg and Leipzig in Germany.[5]

In 1867 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh his proposer being Sir Andrew Douglas Maclagan.[5]

He taught in the Edinburgh Extramural School of Medicine, giving lectures on physiology and histology at Surgeon's Hall. Between 1863 and 1869 he was Physician to the Royal Hospital for Sick Children.[2] In 1873 he was appointed Professor of Physiology at the Royal Manchester School of Medicine. He was also Physician to the Manchester Hospital for Consumption.[3] In 1872 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society and delivered its Croonian Lecture in 1902.[6] Manuscript notes of Gamgee's physiology lectures from both Edinburgh and Manchester survive as part of the Manchester Medical Manuscripts Collection held by special collections at the University of Manchester with the reference MMM/19/1.

From 1884 to 1886 he was Fullerian Professor of Physiology and Comparative Anatomy at the Royal Institution of Great Britain;[7] he did not serve the full three years of the Fullerian appointment because he resigned his chair in 1886 to take up private practice.[8][9] He was also the author of A Text-book of the Physiological Chemistry of the Animal Body: including an account of the chemical changes occurring in disease, published in 1880.[10]

Arthur Gamgee was fluent in French, German, and Italian.[2]

On 29 March 1909, he died of pneumonia during a visit to Paris. He was buried in the family vault in Arnos Vale Cemetery, Bristol.[2]

Family

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He married Mary Louisa Clark in 1875.

He was the brother of John Gamgee and Joseph Sampson Gamgee and uncle of D'Arcy Thompson.[2]

References

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  1. ^ The 1909 obituary for Gamgee in the journal Nature claims that he was Fullerian Professor from 1882 to 1885, but the Nature obituary and several other sources are wrong.
  2. ^ a b c d e Power D'A, Davies RE (2004). "Gamgee, Arthur (1841–1909)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/33317. Retrieved 26 June 2010. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  3. ^ a b "ARTHUR GAMGEE, M.D.Edin., F.R.C.P.Edin. and Lond., F.R.S". British Medical Journal. 1 (2519): 933–934. 10 April 1909. doi:10.1136/bmj.1.2519.933-a. PMC 2318586.
  4. ^ Gamgee, Arthur (1862). Contributions to the physiology and chemistry of foetal nutrition (Thesis). Edinburgh Medical School. hdl:1842/31773.
  5. ^ a b Biographical Index of Former Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh 1783–2002 (PDF). The Royal Society of Edinburgh. July 2006. ISBN 0-902-198-84-X. Archived from the original (PDF) on 24 January 2013. Retrieved 17 June 2016.
  6. ^ "Library and Archive catalogue". Royal Society. Retrieved 31 January 2011.
  7. ^ "Arthur Gamgee appointed Fullerian Professor for 3 years". Chemical News and Journal of Industrial Science. Vol. 50. 1884. p. 21.
  8. ^ "vacany in the Fullerian Professorship of Physiology". List of the Members, Officers, and Professors. Royal Institute of Great Britain. 1887.
  9. ^ Lee, Sidney, ed. (1912). "Gamgee, Arthur" . Dictionary of National Biography (2nd supplement). London: Smith, Elder & Co. This 1912 Supplement to the Dictionary of National Biography contains several errors.
  10. ^ Gamgee, Arthur (1880). A Text-book of the Physiological Chemistry of the Animal Body, including an account of the chemical changes occurring in disease. London: Macmillan.

Further reading

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Academic offices
Preceded by Fullerian Professor of Physiology
1884–1886
Succeeded by