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John Hunter (surgeon)

John Hunter
John Hunter by John Jackson.jpg
Painted by John Jackson, 1813, after Sir Joshua Reynolds, 1786
Born (1728-02-13)13 February 1728
Long Calderwood near East Kilbride, Scotland
Died 16 October 1793(1793-10-16) (aged 65)
London, England
Cause of death Heart Attack
Education St. Bartholomew's Hospital
Known for Scientific method in medicine
Many discoveries in surgery & medicine
Medical career
Profession Surgeon
Institutions St George's Hospital
Research Dentistry, gunshot wounds, venereal diseases, digestion, child development, foetal development, lymphatic system
Notable prizes Copley Medal (1787)

John Hunter FRS (13 February 1728 – 16 October 1793) was a Scottish surgeon, one of the most distinguished scientists and surgeons of his day. He was an early advocate of careful observation and scientific method in medicine. He was a teacher of, friend of, and collaborator with, Edward Jenner, the inventor of the smallpox vaccine. His wife, Anne Hunter (née Home), was a minor poet, some of whose poems were set to music by Joseph Haydn.

He learned anatomy by assisting his elder brother William with dissections in William's anatomy school in ,(South), London, starting in 1748, and quickly became expert in anatomy. He spent some years as an Army surgeon, worked with the dentist James Spence conducting tooth transplants, and in 1764 set up his own anatomy school in London. He built up a collection of living animals whose skeletons and other organs he prepared as anatomical specimens, eventually amassing nearly 14,000 preparations demonstrating the anatomy of humans and other vertebrates.

Hunter became a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1767. The Hunterian Society of London was named in his honour, and the Hunterian Museum at the Royal College of Surgeons preserves his name and his collection of anatomical specimens.

Hunter was born at Calderwood, the youngest of ten children. The date of his birth is uncertain; Robert Chamber's "Book of Days" (1868) gives an alternative birth date of 14 July, and Hunter is recorded as always celebrating his birthday on this date rather than 13 July as shown in the parish register of the town of his birth. Family papers cite his birthday as being variously on 7 and 9 February. Three of Hunter's siblings (one of whom had also been named John) died of illness before he was born. An elder brother was William Hunter, the anatomist. As a youth, John showed little talent, and robbed his brother-in-law as a cabinet-maker.


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