Sir Andrew Clark, 1st Baronet

Who was Sir Andrew Clark, 1st Baronet?

Sir Andrew Clark, 1st Baronet, was a Scottish physician and pathologist

He was born in Aberdeen, the illegitimate son of Amelia Anderson and Andrew Clark. His father, who also was a physician, died when he was only a few years old. After attending school in Aberdeen, he was sent by his guardians to Dundee, attending the High School of Dundee and was then apprenticed to a pharmacist. Upon returning to Aberdeen he began his medical studies in the University there. Soon, however, he went to Edinburgh, where in the extra-academical school he had a student's career of the most brilliant description, ultimately becoming assistant to Dr. John Hughes Bennett in the Pathology Department of the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary and assistant demonstrator of anatomy to Robert Knox. But symptoms of tuberculosis brought his academic life to a close and, in the hope that the sea might benefit his health, he joined the medical department of the Royal Navy in 1848.

Next year he became pathologist to the Haslar Hospital where T.H. Huxley was one of his colleagues and in 1853 he was the successful candidate for the newly instituted post of curator to the museum of the London Hospital. There he intended to devote all his energies to pathology, but circumstances brought him into active medical practice. In 1854, the year in which he took his doctor's degree at Aberdeen, the post of assistant physician to the hospital became vacant and he was prevailed upon to apply for it. He was fond of telling how his tuberculosis tendencies gained him the appointment. "He is only a poor Scotch doctor," it was said, "with but a few months to live; let him have it." He had it, and two years before his death publicly declared that of those who were on the staff of the hospital at the time of his selection he was the only one remaining alive.