Archibald Watson

Archibald Watson FRCS, (27 July 1849 – 30 July 1940) was an Australian surgeon and professor of anatomy at the University of Adelaide.

Early life

Watson was born at Tarcutta, New South Wales, the son of Sydney Grandison Watson, a retired naval officer who became a squatter on the upper Murraycite web |url=http://gutenberg.net.au/dictbiog/0-dict-biogWa.html#watson1 |title=Watson, Archibald |accessdate=2007-09-18 |author=Percival Serle |work=Dictionary of Australian Biography |publisher=Angus & Robertson |year=1949] . He was educated at a national school in Sydney and then Scotch College, Melbourne 1861–67, where he was a champion light-weight boxer. As an agent for his father, he arrived in Fiji on 10 March 1871 and was aboard the "Carl" in the Solomon Islands 1871–72 which was involved in blackbirding. The captain of the "Carl", Joseph Armstrong, was later sentenced to death. Watson was charged with piracy upon returning to Fiji and was later discharged from bail.cite web |url=http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A120444b.htm |title=Watson, Archibald (1849 - 1940) |accessdate=2007-09-18 |author=Ronald Elmslie, Susan Nance |work=Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 12 |publisher=MUP |year=1972 |pages=pp 394-396] .

Career

Watson met Baron Ferdinand von Mueller and was advised to take up a scientific career, Watson went to Europe to study medicine, obtaining the degrees of M.D., Gottingen, M.D., University of Paris, and F.R.C.S., England. After doing post-graduate work at Paris he was for some time demonstrator of anatomy to Professor J. Cantlie at the Charing Cross Hospital medical school. In 1883 he went to Egypt as surgeon with Hicks Pasha's Sudan force, and in 1885 became first Elder professor of anatomy at the newly-founded medical school at Adelaide. He taught also pathology, surgical anatomy, and operative surgery. He held this position for 34 years and proved to be a teacher of remarkable personality. During the Boer war he was consulting-surgeon for the Natal field force. When World War I broke out in 1914, though 65 years of age, Watson left Australia with the first expeditionary force as a major in the Royal Australian Army Medical Corps and became consulting-surgeon and pathologist to No. 1 Australian Stationary Hospital at Heliopolis in Egypt. He returned to Australia in 1916. Watson visited China, South America, Japan, Russia and New Zealand where he usually watched leading surgeons perform operations; although he regarded Sydney's Sir Alexander MacCormick as superior.

Late life

Watson resigned his university chair at the end of 1919 and spent many years travelling, visiting places as far apart as Iceland and the Falkland Islands. He journeyed round Australia gathering marine specimens and fishing. The 'Archibald Watson Prize' at the University of Adelaide was founded by public subscription in 1935. For the last two years of his life, he lived on Thursday Island where died on 30 July 1940, three days after turning 91. He was unmarried. He is commemorated by a memorial lecture at the invitation of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons. His portrait (by William Beckwith McInnes) hangs in the Adelaide University's anatomy department.

References

Additional sources listed by the "Australian Dictionary of Biography"::Royal Society of South Australia, "Transactions", 16, pt 2, 1893; "Lone Hand", 1 Jan 1914; "Adelaide University Magazine", 2, no 1, Sept 1919; "Medical Journal of Australia", 12 Oct 1940, p 361, 27 Sept 1947, p 381, 29 Apr 1950, p 549; Adelaide Medical Students Society, "AMSS Review", Aug 1961, p 19; R. G. Elmslie, 'The Colonial Career of James Patrick Murray', "Australian and New Zealand Journal of Surgery", 49, no 1, 1979; "Sydney Morning Herald", 20-23 Nov 1872, 1 Mar 1873, 30 Sept 1930, 30 July 1936; "Observer" (Adelaide), 15 Feb 1896, 20 Jan 1900, 26 May 1928; News (Adelaide), 31 July 1940; "Chronicle" (Adelaide), 15 Aug 1940; GRG 2/5/23, 43 and D5390 [Misc] and PRG 128/12/7 and 30/5/7-9 (State Library of South Australia); Royal Australasian College of Surgeons Archives (Melbourne); Marston collection, folders 33-71, especially MS 1682/65 no 3847-49 (National Library of Australia); Attorney-General and Justice Dept, special bundles, 1836-76, 4/2698B (State Records New South Wales); Land Claims Commission 1875-82, claim no 606, 782 998 (National Archives of Fiji, Suva).

External links

* [http://www.adelaide.edu.au/prizes/health/medical/archibald_watson_prize.html The Archibald Watson Prize] at The University of Adelaide
* [http://www.surgeons.org/Content/NavigationMenu/WhoWeAre/AwardsLecturesandPrizes/archibald_watson.pdf Archibald Watson Medal and Lecture] at the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons
* [http://www.flickr.com/photos/the_university_of_adelaide/1354349376/ Photograph of Watson and students]

Further reading

*Jennifer M. T. Carter, "Painting the Islands Vermillion: Archibald Watson and the Brig "Carl", Melbourne, Melbourne University Press, 1999; ISBN 0522 84853 2; 279 pp;