FREDERIC WOOD JONES AT SCHOOL AND AT UNIVERSITY

Aust. N.Z. J . Surg. (1994). 64,21-31 21

FREDERIC WOOD JONES AT SCHOOL AND AT UNIVERSITY

B. E. CHRISTOPHERS

THE TIME, THE PLACE, THE OCCASION, THE PERSONAGES

The time: October 1, 1895. The place: the Medical College of the London Hospital, Whitechapel, London (Fig. 1). The occasion: the opening day of the academic year of the Medical School of the College. The personages: of those participating in this ceremony were three people who played an important role in English medical history: Sir James Paget (1 8 14-99) who presided at this ceremony; Sir John Hughlings-Jackson (1835-191 1) (Fig. 2) and Sir Jonathon Hutchinson (1825-1913) both of whom had just retired from the staff of the Hospital.

THE YOUNG ARTHUR KEITH Also participating in this ceremony was the young Arthur Keith. He had just been appointed to his first academic post as Senior Demonstrator in Anatomy to the College. It may be that Arthur Keith’s posthumous claim to fame will be that it was he who nurtured the subject of this article, the master anatomist Frederic Wood Jones. It was not until 1897, 2 years later, that Wood Jones enrolled at the College and attended Keith’s lectures in anatomy.

ENFIELD GRAMMAR SCHOOL In 1895 Wood Jones was in his second last year as a student at Enfield Grammar School. He had attended this school as a day student from 1892.

Enfield Grammar School was the chosen school for his secondary education for straightforward reasons. The family home at this time was in Enfield (a suburb of London), his parents were practising members of the Church of England and the family was sufficiently well- endowed to be able to comfortably afford private school fees for him.

In a school photograph of 1895 the Headmaster of the School W. S. Ridewood BA, BSc (London), is pictured sitting next to his students (Fig. 3). The legend of the original photograph lists the surnames of those present. Jones, as Wood Jones’ surname was then, is third from the right in the third row from the front. A brief resume of his origins will clarify this variance from his family name.

HIS ORIGINS Frederic Wood Jones was the only son of Lucy [nee Allin] and Charles Henry Jones. He was the youngest of

Correspondence: Dr B. E. Christophers, 377 Church St, Richmond,

Accepted for publication 4 August 1993.

Vic. 3121, Australia.

Fig. 2. Sir John Hughlings-Jackson FRS, MD.

their three children. He was born at 90 Norfolk Road [renamed Cecelia Road] Shaklewell, West Hackney, London on 23 January 1879.

Watercolours painted by him when he was 20 years old were signed F. Wood Jones. Thereafter, and maybe for some time before this, he incorporated his second given name ‘Wood’ as part of his surname: unhyphenated Wood Jones. The name Wood was derived from his maternal grandmother Martha Wood Allin [nee Edward]; and the name Frederic was derived from his maternal

28 CHRISTOPHERS

Fig. 3. The Headmaster of Enfield Grammar School (W. S. Ridewood) with pupils of the school 1895.

grandfather Frederic Allin (a Church of England Clergyman).

‘HIS SCHOOL CAREER WAS QUITE UNDISTINGUISHED’

Of his school career Sir Wilfred E. Le Gros Clark wrote, a little unkindly:

‘As a boy he was a keen entomologist and showed an unusual interest in all branches of natural history . . . These pursuits engaged much of his attention during his school days and with a number of interruptions due to ill health, no doubt accounted for the fact that his school career was quite undistinguished. . . he also found some

difficulty in passing the examination for the London University Matriculation.’ I

Enfield Grammar School was kind enough to supply the following details of some of Wood Jones’ examination results from the school. 1892: Prize for ‘Electricity’; 1893: ‘Old Park Prize’ for good conduct (four pounds ten shillings); 1894: Upper Division ‘Holy Scripture Prize’ (also prizes for English, Latin, French and Chemistry); 1895: (Form VI) Prizes for French and Latin, Science and Art examination, freehand second class [honour], model drawing advanced first class [honour]. These results may not mark him as a prodigy; but do they warrant Le Gros Clark’s description of them as a school career ‘quite undistinguished’?

FREDERIC WOOD JONES: SCHOOL AND UNIVERSITY 29

FORMAL EXAMINATIONS Le Gros Clark’s explanation of Wood Jones’ ‘undistinguished’ school career is an incomplete one. Formal examinations were, and still are, a treacherous (some would say disastrous) method of estimating intellectual ability, and even of reckoning knowledge. Wood Jones was acutely aware of this problem and, when he became a teacher and an examiner, he did his utmost to reform the examination system. He made it a habit, as far as was possible, to find out what the student knew, rather than what the student didn’t know. His own experiences no doubt stood him in good stead in recognizing the pitfalls of formal examinations.

HIS ACADEMIC MEDALS In no way did Wood Jones blame Enfield Grammar School for the difficulty he found in passing the matriculation examination for the London University.

Part of his will reads: ‘I give to the Governors of Enfield Grammar School my academic medals both British and Australian in recognition of the educational benefits I derived from the School’. Nine medals were duly lodged with the School after his death and are now sealed in a display panel fixed to the wall of the garret of the Tudor School House. It could well be that Wood Jones, like John Hunter, was unspoiled by a narrow systematic training at School. One of the benefits derived from Enfield Grammar School may have been that it did not scathe him.

GEORGE WHEELER - A DISREPUTABLE FRIEND OF HIS YOUTH

That Wood Jones had an ‘unusual interest in all branches of natural history’ is an understatement. It would be

Y.w J 4 / 1 ?

Fig. 4. Freehand drawing by Wood Jones; drawn on page one of his sister Elsie’s album on 21 January 1894, 2 days prior to his fifteenth birthday.

nearer the truth to say that natural history for him was a passion rather than an interest. There is no evidence that this passion was parentally inspired, nor is there, in the archival material at Enfield Grammar School, any evidence for this flair. What did spark this interest in natural history? George Wheeler may well have helped kindle the spark. Evidence for this appears in one of Wood Jones’ last articles, published in the October 1953 issue of A Medical The article is entitled ‘Concerning Nettles’ and there is no one better to tell the story than the master himself:

‘I am no botanist, but that is not because as a child I lacked interest in the wild flowers of the English country- side, or as a man have failed to appreciate the beauties and the wonders of plant life in those parts of the world in which I have chanced to live. I think the fault lies in the fact that in the nineties, I was taught botany as part of the so-called scientific curriculum of a medical education. I entered upon that course of botany as the young Erasmus Darwin, with the “Loves of Flowers” in his heart, might have done. I emerged from it with an abiding resolve that, if that were the way in which botanists studied their science, academic botany was a subject that I did not wish to pursue.

But before I suffered that sterilizing course of structural botany in the curriculum of London University, I had picked up some queer trifles of botanical lore from a disreputable friend of my youth named George Wheeler. George was in part an agricultural labourer, but he had in addition poaching, mole-catching, bird-snaring and prize- fighting as side lines. It was he who taught me how to use bird-lime, and so destroyed all my faith in those books for boys which deal with this nicely adjusted art. He was a master of noose and net, and above all he was a most observant man and a first class field naturalist. It was George who told me all about the remarkable circum- stances of the sexual life of the mole. He knew that all moles appear to be males until the second year of their lives and only then, in their first breeding season, does any outward difference of sex become apparent. It was many years after we parted - he to the local gaol for manfully defending the honour of his gypsy wife and I for foreign parts - that I found that what he had told me concerning the mole was indeed the truth of the matter.

It was from George that I learned the simple facts regarding the places where nettles flourish . . .’

MEDICAL COLLEGE, LONDON UNIVERSITY Wood Jones chose to matriculate with the London Uni- versity in order to undertake a combined science and medical course at the Medical College of that University. Like most medical schools in England it began as an appendage to a Hospital, in this case the London Hospital. Opening in 1785 it was the first complete medical school in England, and was built in a comer of the Hospital grounds. Wood Jones’ matriculation was registered on 15 February 1897, and he commenced preliminary science classes in May of that year.

In The London Hospital Medical College Register of Students3 Jones Frederic Wood is described as a ‘Perpetual

30 CHRISTOPHERS

Student’ and as having come ‘from Mr Ridewood’s School ’ .

A LECTURE BY ARTHUR KEITH His scheduled lectures in anatomy and physiology did not commence until October of 1897; but before this he had stolen into an anatomy lecture given by Arthur Keith. This he recalls in a letter to Arthur Keith (by then Sir Arthur Keith) dated 3 February 1947.4

‘This is to carry from Gertrude and from me all good wishes, and all hopes that these good wishes may be repeated for many years to come - on your birthday.

It is a long time ago (1897) that as a first-year student I sneaked into and was fascinated by, a lecture you gave on a boy with an extra pair of legs (a parasitic foetus) who was on show in Wonderland. That’s more than fifty years ago. I have a fancy that in parental fashion, you still look on me as a wayward youngster (which was quite true, A.K.) - (you do, don’t you?); but I would have you know that I am over seventy now and almost grown up. Seventy or twenty it is no matter. I loved and admired you then and I still do and will. And Gertrude and I send our love to you.

Freddy ’ .

THE KINDLER OF HIS LOVE OF ANATOMY Unquestionably it was Arthur Keith who kindled the love of anatomy in Wood Jones. This is acknowledged many times by Wood Jones in letters that he wrote to Keith. In one particular letter, written in July 1936, Wood Jones unequivocally and generously acknowledges that it was Arthur Keith who gave him ‘the incentive for taking up the right road’.5 This acknowledgement is so sensitively bestowed that it is quoted verbatim:

‘I imagine that you could undertake a very wide tour and be certain that in most of the places you visited there would be some man who had been a student of yours and who would be honoured to extend a welcome to you. That probably is the teacher’s most obvious reward. The other and the more spiritual one is that you may know that there may be some who owe to you the incentive for taking up the right road: - the incentive to go on and stick to it . . .

I took up anatomy because in the very beginning of my second year’s work you did not snub me when I showed you the drawings I had made of lymphoid tissue in a frog’s intestine - done in my first year’s work. Not only did you not snub me, you were very gracious about it all. I packed up the drawings and became an anatomist: - in the end a poor one: but one that has tried to pass on your torch to younger men. So there. Call me a bad boy or not. Tell me that I am a very sorry anatomist if you will - I shall not mind. You did it and you know it.’

Because Arthur Keith was such a wise and faithful counsellor to Wood Jones it is fitting that a resume of his life be reproduced here. Who was this person who gave Wood Jones the incentive for taking up the right road? The most appropriate synopsis of Arthur Keith’s life is the one written by Wood Jones himself, given in his

review of Arthur Keith’s autobiography and published in the Manchester Guardian.6

SIR ARTHUR KEITH ‘No man’s story of his own life can fail to be of interest to others if it be written in sincerity. Even if the stage be small and the role of the actor only a minor one those interactions of chance and circumstance with human personality that shape the destinies of any individual are of necessity of some importance to his fellows. With Sir Arthur Keith the stage has not been small nor has his part in the scientific life of the past half-century been by any means a minor one. That his autobiography has been written in sincerity is manifest; for were this not to be the case some passages in the book would possibly have failed to gain the permanence of print.

The scene opens in 1866 in Quarry Farm at Persley, near Aberdeen, where John Keith and his wife farmed the land and raised a family of ten children of which Arthur was the sixth child and fourth son. From childhood and schooldays we are taken to Aberdeen, where Keith entered the medical school under William Stirling as physiologist and John Struthers as anatomist. Here are rehearsed the usual phases of the life of the hardworking and ambitious Scottish student whose parents are ill able to afford a higher education for all of their numerous children. Keith’s academic career was one of well-planned success, culminating in medical graduation with ‘highest honours’ in 1888. There followed some short periods as assistant or locum tenens which were neither eventful nor satisfying, and then, early in the following year, came the translation to Siam, the fever-stricken and unprofitable goldmines and, above all, the gibbons in the jungle. It was these gibbons that were responsible for so much of Keith’s subsequent creed as to man’s origin. It might be claimed with some justification that the gibbons in the jungle of Bangtophan and the aura of Charles Darwin at Downe, combined with a typical Scottish determination to achieve success, constitute the outstanding factors in determining our author’s distinguished career.

On returning from Siam in 1892 there was a difficult period of waiting for admission to the ranks of the teaching staff of a medical school. It was not until the opening of the winter session of 1895 that the position of Senior Demonstrator in Anatomy at the Medical School of the London Hospital was achieved. A great ambition had now become a reality: Keith had his foot on the bottom rung of the ladder of the anatomical world. How he climbed that ladder from demonstratorship to knight- hood, from struggling teacher to the eminence of becoming Lord Rector of his old university, is told with a wealth of detail, taken from his diaries, in the seven hundred pages of his well-documented autobiography. We are told of successes and setbacks, of periods of great activity alternating with recurrent bouts of sickness, and of human relationships with his contemporaries in an almost day- to-day narration of events. In spite of the rare setbacks and the all too frequent attacks of illness, the progress from February 5, 1866, to July 5 , 1946, is a continuously upward trend towards the attainment of scientific emin-


ence and social advancement; but no man may achieve these things without encountering opposition or even without making enemies.

Certainly Keith had his opponents and it is character- istic of him that in his own frank story of his life he has treated them with great generosity. His enemies he treats with kindness and respect; his friends are perhaps almost unduly lauded. Only one man he treats with a somewhat harsh judgement, only one he regards with a critical and not altogether favourable attitude, and that is himself. This is to one who has known him for over fifty years a source of regret, since in years to come, when he is no longer with us, a younger generation reading these pages may fancy him as somewhat less than the man he was’.6

It is interesting to compare Wood Jones’ candid opinion of Sir Arthur Keith’s autobiography with his official view of it. In a letter to a friend dated 12 February 1950 Wood Jones wrote: ‘Somehow this autobiography seems to leave him [Sir Arthur Keith] smaller than my estimate of him’. That Wood Jones was critical of Sir Arthur Keith’s autobiography is understandable because it was he who inspired Wood Jones to become an anatomist. Wood Jones found it hard to reconcile the Keith who wrote such a ‘tedious’ book with the Keith who kindled the love of anatomy in him.

How could this Keith be reconciled with the one who, in his autobiography, wrote about ‘the price he paid for everything and the exact amounts he got for every lecture and review’.

STUDENT-TEACHER Such was the relationship between student and teacher that while Wood Jones was at the Medical College Keith was invited to the Jones’ home in Enfield. Keith’s recol- lections of these visits imply that they were not infrequent:

‘ “Freddy”, as we all called him in these early days, and continued so to name him in his maturity, was born in the parish of Hackney in North-east London, but by the time I came to know his family it had moved out to a comfortable home in Enfield - a home where after Sunday dinner, we continued to sit round a table laden with fruit and sweets, to talk and sip our wine. His father was a slate merchant, but the member of his family which held the visitor’s attention was his mother, a woman of remarkably striking presence, with finely cut features and luminous eyes, which Freddy inherited as he did many of her other qualities’ (Fig. 5) . And Wood Jones was a visitor to the Keith household as Keith recalls in his autobiography: *

‘Of the students who came to stay with us at the Chantry, the favourite-in-chief was Frederic Wood Jones. His brain was always at work, his eye ever observing; he had wit and a multitude of interests. He was the pleasant- est of companions; there was no end to the conversation that went on between Celia [Keith] and him. It was he who explored the loft of the Chantry in his pyjamas and found it to be the home of three kinds of bats. And what a mess he made of his pyjamas’.

Fig. 6. Sir Arthur Keith.

THEIR FRIENDSHIP

Their friendship lasted a lifetime. It always retained that quality befitting a student-teacher relationship. They were destined to differ on so many anatomical and zoological questions, but this never sullied their mutual regard for one another. When Keith was knighted in 1923 Wood Jones wrote a letter of congratulations to him and addressed him as Sir Arthur (Fig. 6). Keith thought that Wood Jones was ribbing him about his newly acquired

32 CHRISTOPHERS

honour. This could not have been further from the truth. From that time on Wood Jones always addressed him as Sir Arthur.

OTHER TEACHERS IN PRE-CLINICAL YEARS Dr James H. Sequeira (later a dermatologist) and Dr Cecil Leaf were Arthur Keith’s assistant demonstrators in anatomy. Another of Wood Jones’ teachers in the pre- clinical years whose encouragement he recorded with gratitude was Chalmers Mitchell, his lecturer in Biology. Chalmers Mitchell (later Sir Peter Chalmers Mitchell) like Arthur Keith was a graduate of the Aberdeen Univer- sity. He was Arthur Keith’s senior by one year and Keith recalls that Mitchell, even when a student, would say things that he knew would scandalize his more traditional colleagues. Later he was elected as Secretary of the Zoological Society of London. He died from injuries he received when struck by a car in 1945.

Wood Jones was generous in his praise of those teachers that he liked; but he was also unsparing in his criticism of those he did not like or those who, in his opinion, were poor teachers. In the latter category was his Botany lecturer, which has already been noted. Another of his teachers whom Wood Jones regarded with dis- favour was Leonard Hill (later Sir Leonard Hill) his lecturer in physiology (Fig. 7). Thirty-nine years after he attended the first lecture given to him by Leonard Hill, Wood Jones wrote?

‘Had Leonard Hill ever encouraged me in the least, I should have been a physiologist . . . for I leaned that way. But Hill always let me know (and probably very rightly) that he regarded me as a superficial young fool’.

PURSUED BEYOND THE GRAVE Wood Jones pursued Leonard Hill beyond the grave. In 1952 he wrote:9

‘More than fifty years have passed since I entered the Medical School of London Hospital and it was the reading of the obituary notice of Leonard Hill in April that sent my mind back to the first lecture that he gave in his physiology course in 1897. It seems that, of all his teaching, it is only this opening lecture that I remember and that merely by reason of a single statement that he made. He was dealing with what we should now term biochemistry, but which was then merely an appendage to the course of real functional human physiology that was known as ‘Chemical Phys.’ I remember nothing of the lecture itself save the assurance he gave us that we should all see life made in the laboratory as a simple routine business before many years were passed. He based this prophecy on the knowledge that had already been attained in the chemistry of the proteins and gave his hearers complete assurance that he was on sure ground’.

ANATOMICAL SOCIETY OF GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND

Such was the encouragement that Arthur Keith bestowed upon Wood Jones and such was Wood Jones’ ability that

Fig. 7. Sir Leonard Hill.

he contributed four papers to the Anatomical Society of Great Britain and Ireland in the years 1900-04 while he was a student. These papers were reproduced in The Journal of Anatomy and Physiology. His paper ‘The Musculature of the Bladder and Urethra’ l o was presented at the May 1902 meeting of the Anatomical Society of Great Britain and Ireland. This meeting of the Society was held at the Charing Cross Hospital Medical School on 9 May 1902. The President Mr C. B. Lockwood occupied the chair: ‘At this meeting F. W. Jones, London Hospital Medical College proposed by A. Keith, H. Rigby, J. H. Watson was elected as a member of the Society’.

HIS CREDITS IN HIS PRE-CLINICAL YEARS At the London University he won a succession of scholar- ships and prizes in biology, anatomy and physiology. These credits are listed in the Register of Students as: ‘Price’ Entrance Science Scholarship 120 pounds, 1898; Anatomy and Biology Scholarship 1899; Anatomy and Physiology Scholarship 1901 . 3

Henry Bashford (later Sir Henry Bashford) was a classmate of Wood Jones at Medical College. In his obituary of Wood Jones, Henry Bashford wrote of him thus: ‘ I ‘Indeed it [his magnetism] was always apparent in the vivid dark eyed boy of 19 who so easily dominated the rest of us in our little class of elementary biology fifty-six years ago at the London Hospital’.


THE

Fig. 8. Sir Frederick Treves, surgeon and master mariner.

CLINICAL YEARS

A dresser to Hurry Fenwick Although his mind was already set on becoming an anatomist, Wood Jones pursued his clinical years enthu- siastically. He received very good reports in all of his clinical subjects and won the first prize (the ‘Anderson’ prize) in Elementary Clinical Medicine in 1902. He was a ‘Dresser’ to Mr Frederic S. Eve (later Sir Frederic Eve), general and brain surgeon; and also a ‘Dresser’ to Mr E. Hurry Fenwick, general and renal surgeon. Hurry Fenwick was a pioneer in the field of urology and features prominently in Leonard Murphy’s definitive monograph ‘The History of Urology’.12

It was Hurry Fenwick who first demonstrated that prostatectomy could be made easier by first breaking through the intraurethral mucosa. In so doing the plane of enucleation was more easily found and the prostate more readily delivered. It was Hurry Fenwick whom Wood Jones chose some years later to care for his beloved father-in-law George Clunies-Ross.

STUDENTS HANDBOOK OF

SURGICAL OPERATIONS

BY

FREDERICK TREVES, F.R.C.S. SUROEON TO AND LECTURER ON ANATOMP AT THE LONDON EOSPITAL

UEMBER OF TEE BOARD OF EXAMINERS OF TRE ROYAL COLLUlE OY SUROEOm EXAMINER IN SURORRY AT THE UNlVRMlTY OF CAWBRlWE

IVITN 94 ILLUSPRATXONS

(Ahridged from thc Author’a “ Manual of Opcrative Surgery ”)

SIXTH THOUSAND

O A S S E L L A N D C O M P A N Y , L I M I T E D LONDON, PARIS 8 MELBOURNE

1895.

ALL RIOHTS RSSERVED

Fig. 9. Title page of Frederick Treves’ The Student’s Handbook of Surgical Operations.

Sir Frederick Treves

The most dominant surgical figure at the London Hospital during Wood Jones’ student days was Mr Frederick Treves (later Sir Frederick Treves, Bt. Surgeon to the King (Fig. 8)). Prior to his appointment as a surgeon to the Hospital he had been a lecturer and demonstrator in anatomy at the Medical College. His book ‘The Student’s Handbook of Surgical operation^"^ was the bible of every medical student in the English speaking world, except perhaps America (Fig. 9).

In 1901 the publishers requested a new edition of this book. This was a timely request, for in that year, he was the most newsworthy surgeon in Britain. In that year on the eve of the coronation he was called upon to perform an appendicectomy on King Edward VII.

34 CHRISTOPHERS

A SIMPLE AND ACCURATE FORM OF SPHYG- MOMETER OR ARTERIAL PRESSURE

GAUGE CONTRIVED FOR CLINICAL USE.

LEONARD HILL, M.B., and HAROLD BARNARD, BY

Leoturer on Phpniolopy, X S , , F.R.C.S.,Surglcul Rcgiatrar, London Elospit.1. Loudon Hospital.

THIS instrument consists of: ( I ) d broad armlet,.which ie strapped round the up er arm. The armlet is formed of a flexible steel band, on tge inside of which there 18 fastened a bag of thin indiarubber. The rubber bag i6 connected by a Y-tube with (2) a emall cornpressing air pump fitted with a valve and (3) a pressure gauge....

-

By means of this instrument which is made for us by Mr. J. Hicke, of 8, Hetton Garden, A.C., we believe that the arterial prossure can be taken in man ns rapidly, simply, and accurately as the temperature can be taken with the clinical thermometer.

Fig. 10. Part of Hill and Barnard’s article on their sphygmo- manometer.

A great nephew of Michael Faraday Another of Wood Jones’ surgical teachers was Mr Harold Leslie Barnard, a great nephew of Michael Faraday. Early in his career Harold Bamard had collaborated with Leon- ard Hill in the development of a ‘simple sphygmomano- meter contrived for clinical use’ (Fig. 10).

In 1900 he became a surgical tutor to the College. As a teacher he was inclined to be boisterous and flamboyant and, as part of his teaching armamentarium, was a frequent user of mnemonics. Bamard made many contributions to the advancement of abdominal surgery including a classical description of subphrenic abscess. His work was cut short by his tragic death at the age of 40; caused by an inoperable malignant tumour. As a memorial to him a committee of the staff of the College decided to publish posthumously his ‘Contributions to Abdominal Surgery’.I4 Mr James Shenin, a surgeon at the Hospital, edited this work and Wood Jones contributed five line drawings to the book.

Sherrin was also a surgical teacher of Wood Jones. He started out as a Master Mariner; turned to medicine as a career, graduating from the London Hospital, became a surgeon there and then, at the height of his success as an abdominal surgeon, went back to sea again.

Another of his teachers in surgery was Mr Jonathan Hutchinson, Jr, and it was he who lectured to Wood Jones on the subject of venereal diseases.

i Fig. 11. Sir Henry Head, FRS.

Teachers in clinical medicine Wood Jones was assigned as a ‘Clinical Clerk’ to Dr Percy Kidd and, on a separate occasion, to the neurologist Dr Henry Head (later Sir Henry Head) who guided him through the intricacies of this discipline (Fig. 11). Head contributed definitive articles on trigeminal neuralgia and herpes zoster to Allbutt’s well known System of Medi- cine.” Head was inclined to loquacity and embroidery but his weekly demonstrations were rarely missed by his students. Other physicians to the London Hospital at this time were Dr Robert Hutchison, Dr Bertrand Dawson and Dr Stephen Mackenzie, brother of the more distinguished Dr Morel Mackenzie, Dr William Bullock was appointed head of the Department of Bacteriology in 1897 and was Wood Jones’ lecturer in this subject.

An Australian connection One of the most revered Presidents of the Royal Austral- asian College of Surgeons was Sir Henry Simpson New- land. He graduated from the Adelaide University in 1896 and soon after set sail for England to undertake postgraduate studies at the London Hospital. So it was that Wood Jones and Henry Newland commenced their studies at the London Hospital Medical College in the same year, 1897: one embarking upon a medical course and the other undertaking postgraduate work.


Newland’s choice of the London Hospital was deter- mined by his desire to become a house-surgeon under Mr Frederick Treves. This was not to be and instead he became a house-surgeon to Mr Jonathon Hutchinson, Jr. It was Arthur Keith who tutored Henry Newland in anatomy for his Primary Fellowship Examination. Al- though Newland worked in the precincts of the London Hospital on and off for nearly 6 years and although their paths must have crossed many times, Wood Jones and Newland were never introduced during this time. In a letter to the author dated 14 July 1961 Sir Henry Simpson Newland wrote: I6

‘When I was at the London Hospital in Mile End Road, London, during the years 1897- 1902 I did not know him. It must have been in 1900-1901 that from time to time I used to see his graceful well dressed figure walking through the quadrangle between the Medical College and the Hospital. I often wondered who it was. In January 1919 I read in The Times (I had not yet been repatriated after World War I) that Professor Watson had resigned the Chair of Anatomy in the University of Adelaide. I at once resolved that I would do what I could to get a first- rate man to fill the vacant chair. I called on my old and much admired teacher then Conservator of the Hunterian Museum at the College of Surgeons and sought his advice. He said “There are two good men, Wood Jones of the Royal Free Medical School and Stopford of St.

Fig. 12. Sir Henry Newland in 1933.

Thomas’s Hospital; but if Wood Jones is allowed to leave England it would be a national calamity. I forthwith wrote to Wood Jones telling him what was afoot and asked him to lunch at the British Empire Club; now defunct, but at that time situated at the north west comer of St. James’s Square. He was very interested in what I had to say and without hesitation said he would seek the position. Accordingly I sent a cable addressed to Sir George Murray, Chancellor of the University of Ad- elaide, in the following terms. ‘Professor Arthur Keith recommends appointment Wood Jones Chair of Anato- my’. The University of Adelaide got in touch with Wood Jones and in due course appointed him to fill the Elder Chair of Anatomy at the pitiful salary of 800 pounds a year! He filled the position with outstanding success and rapidly became a dominant figure in the University of Adelaide’.

Their association and friendship continued during the time that Wood Jones was Professor of Anatomy at the Adelaide University (1920-26).

His credentials The various certificates Wood Jones obtained throughout his course, as entered in the Register of Students3 are: Passed Preliminary Science London (First Division) July 1898; Passed Intermediate Science London July 1899; Passed Secondary Board April 1900, Passed Primary Fellowship May 1901; Passed Intermediate MB, London July 1901; BSc, London (Research) October 1903; MRCS, LRCP January 1904; MB, London May 1904; BS, London November 1904.

THE LONDON HOSPITAL GAZETTE

Wood Jones had a zest for writing and had an abiding interest in the use and nuances of words. He became a member of the editorial staff of The London Hospital Gazette in July of 1900 and later editor of this journal.

A bad article That Wood Jones was a contributor to the Gazette is certain for in Chapter XX of his book Unscientific Excur- sions he wrote: ”

‘Many years ago I wrote an article for a students’ magazine. It was a bad article; but it was published. It was published because I was editor of the magazine; and it was a bad article, not so much by reason of its matter, but because it had a meretricious air of cleverness about it’.

The ‘bad article’ referred to in Unscientific Excursions is almost certainly the one entitled ‘Clinical Observations in the Railway Carriage’ and it was written under the pseudonym of ‘The 9.15’.’* It was published in The London Hospital Gazette in 1904 when, as Wood Jones says, he was editor of the magazine. In this article Wood Jones wrote:

‘. . . Railway travelling is like marriage in this, that it is the length of the journey that discovers the faults. A man may get in at one station and make clicking noises with his mouth, if he gets out at the next we forget and forgive him, but if we travel a long journey with

36 CHRISTOPHERS

him - and I have been repeatedly told that the same sort of principle holds good in matrimony . . .’

Years later came the confession by the author that he considered it was a ‘bad article’.

A radical sentiment Another of his contributions to The London Hospital Gazette is entitled ‘The ll%’, and it appeared in the Gazette in 1902.” That it was written by Wood Jones is evidenced by the fact that it is bound with other of his works and lodged in the Wood Jones’ Collection in the Library of the Royal College of Surgeons of England. These bound works were part of his personal material, which Wood Jones bequeathed to Miss Jessie Dobson. She, in turn, bequeathed them to the Royal College of Surgeons of England. The following is an extract from this article:

‘There are, perhaps, few things in which the opinion of the world is so warped, and in which it shows so narrow an horizon - as its judgement of what constitutes a life of success or a life of failure.

The protuberant abdomen, the large white waistcoat, the massive watch chain, and the shiny boots and hat - these, as often as not, are the outward and visible signs of what the world knows as a successful man. It is not enough that a life should be well spent, that good should be done, or that knowledge should be added to our little fund - all these may be done again and again, and yet the world - its opinions guided by unaltering and unthinkable forms of argument - will rank that life as one of the comparative failures’.

Other contributions and his ‘idiosyncratic’ punctuation

It is very likely that he contributed articles to the Gazette apart from the two already mentioned. No articles in the Gazette during the time that he was a student appear under his name or initials.

A judgement had to be made as to which of the articles appearing in the Gazette in the years 1897-1904 may have been written by him. The decision regarding these articles was based upon the theme of the article and the literary style of the article. One aspect of the style that was taken into account was that of punctuation. Wood Jones kept a letter which criticized his ‘idiosyncratic’ punctuation and this letter may be found in his Collection at the Royal College of Surgeons of England. This letter dated 6 February 1940 was from a V. H. Collins.2o In this letter Collins makes the following comment on the punctuation in Wood Jones’ book Life and living: ‘. . . respect- fully suggest that your written work riots in the use of what seems to me a supertluous comma separating an adverb or an adverbial phrase from the words that closely follow it and qualify it’. The letter then goes on to list in detail more than 60 examples of what V. H. Collins considers to be ‘a superfluous comma’.

Based on the criteria of content and style, a list of Wood Jones’ likely (probable and possible) contributions to the Gazette during that time was made. These articles

are listed on page 27 of ‘A Supplement to a List of the Works of Frederic Wood Jones, 1879-1954’.2’

THE BOER WAR Frederic Wood Jones was in his second year of university study at the outbreak of the Boer War, which began in 1899. This war lasted until 31 May 1902 and during this time it figured prominently in the lives of all Britons.

News from the front was reported at length and regu- larly in The London Hospital Gazette. In a letter to an Australian friend in November 1939 Wood Jones wrote: ‘I volunteered for the Boer War in 1900. I was young in the Boer War days and easily made enthusiastic by well directed propaganda’.22 His application for service was rejected, presumably on the grounds of his medical studentship.

THESIS FOR BACHELOR OF SCIENCE Wood Jones’ BSc degree was obtained in October of 1903 by way of research. The results of this research were submitted in the form of a thesis, whose title was ‘Development and Musculature of the Visceral Openings of the Hind End’. A brief summary of the clinical side of this paper entitled ‘The nature of the malformations of the rectum and urogenital passages’ was published in The British Medical Journal in 1904.23 Towards the expenses of this investigation a grant was received from the British Medical Association. The full thesis could not be traced at either The University of London, The London Hospital Medical College or The British Medical Association.

WOOD JONES’ FIRST VISIT TO AUSTRALIA The last entry in the Register of Students for Jones, Frederic Wood reads: ‘0. P. Clinical Assistant (Medical) [Dr Henry Head’s Clinic] Aug. 1st 1904 to Dec. 21st 1905. Resigned to take appointment abroad. Very Good’.3 That appointment abroad in January of 1905 was as Medical Officer to the Eastern Extension Telegraph Com- pany. This post took him, first, to the head office of the Company in Singapore, then for a 15 month uninterrupted stay on Keeling-Cocos Atoll and finally as Ship’s Sur- geon for 3 months on the C. S. [Cable Ship] Patrol. It was during this time that Wood Jones first set foot on Australian shores, for the C. S. Patrol called in at Brisbane once and at Sydney twice.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS For the details of Wood Jones’ origins the author is indebted to Marion and John Bolitho of Hertfordshire, England. They are the custodians of the Jones’ family history and the compilers of the Jones’ genealogy. Marion Bolitho’s grandfather, Harry Evan Jones, was a brother to Wood Jones’ father, Charles Henry Jones.

The author would like to thank Enfield Grammar School for supplying the school photograph of 1895 and for supplying Wood Jones’ examination results at their school. Mr James Guest gave me the details and a photograph of Wood Jones’ academic medals which were

FREDERIC WOOD JONES: SCHOOL AND UNIVERSITY

lodged with Enfield Grammar School after his death. For that I am most grateful.

The author would like to thank May and Baker, The Royal Society, The Royal College of Surgeons of Eng- land, The Royal London Hospital (formerly The London Hospital), The British Medical Journal, the Annals of the Royal College of Surgeons of England and The Man- chesrer Guardian for permission to publish material from their journals and newspapers. Acknowledgement is also due to Edward Arnold for permission to reproduce material from a book published by them.

It was Jonathon Evans, archivist to The Royal London Hospital, who first alerted the author to the existence of The London Medical College Register of Students and it was he who gave permission to publish material from this document. The photographs of John Hughlings-Jackson, Sir Henry Head, Sir Leonard Hill, Sir Arthur Keith, Sir Frederick Treves and The London Hospital, from Sir John Ellis’s LHMC 1785-1985 were generously supplied by the Archives and Museum section of The Royal London Hospital.

The South Australian Fellows of The Royal Austral- asian College of Surgeons kindly granted permission to reproduce a photograph of Sir Henry Simpson New- land from their publication, Henry Simpson Newland by J. Estcourt Hughes.

The author would also like to acknowledge the assis- tance of Mrs Sally Hellwege.

REFERENCES Le Gros Clark WE. (1955) Frederic Wood Jones. Bio- graphical Memoirs of Fellows of The Royal Society 1955;

Wood Jones F. Concerning Nettles. A Medical Bulletin

The London Hospital Medical College Register of Students ‘D’ (covering the period 1886-97). Lodged in The Royal London Hospital Archives and Museum, at The Royal London Hospital (Whitechapel). Keith A. In Memoriam. Frederic Wood Jones (1 879-1954). Formerly Sir William Collins Professor and Honorary

1: 119-34.

1953; 6: 27-9.

5.

6.

7.

8. 9.

10.

11.

12.

13.

14.

15.

16. 17.

18.

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Curator of the Hunterian Collection of Human and Com- parative Anatomy, Royal College of Surgeons. Ann. R . CON. Surg. Engl. 1954; 15: 335-9. Wood Jones F. Letter to Arthur Keith, 1936. Lodged in the Wood Jones’ Collection in the Library of the Royal College of Surgeons of England. Wood Jones F. Sir Arthur Keith. The Manchester Guard- ian, 1950; March 14:4. Wood Jones F. Letter to Ulrica Hubbe, 1950. Lodged in the Wood Jones’ Collection in the Library of the Royal College of Surgeons of England. Keith A. An Autobiography. London: Watts & Co., 1950. Wood Jones F. Fifty years of fallacies. The London Hospi- tal Gazette. 1952; 55: 117. Wood Jones F. The Musculature of the bladder and urethra. J. Anat. Physiol. 1902; 36, Ii-Ivi. Bashford HH, Wood Jones F. MB, DSc, FRCS, FRS Br. Med. J. 1954; 2: 996. Murphy LJT. The History of Urology. Springfield. Charles C. Thomas, 1972. Treves F. The Student’s Handbook of Surgical Operations. London: Cassell and Company, 1895. Bamard HL. Intestinal obstruction. In: Sherrin J. (ed.). Contributions to Abdominal Surgery. London: Edward Arnold, 1910. Allbutt C., Rolleston HD. (eds) A System of Medicine, Vol. VII, London: Macmillan and Co., 191 1. Newland HS. Letter to BE Christophers. 1961. Wood Jones F. Unscientific Excursions. London: Edward Arnold, 1934. Wood Jones F. (under the pseudonym of ‘The 9.15’) Clinical observations in the railway carriage. The London Hospital Gazette. 1904; 10: 106-7. Wood Jones F. (written anonymously) The 11%. The London Hospital Gazette 1902; 8: 209- 1 1. Collins VH. Letter to Wood Jones, 1904. Lodged in the Wood Jones’ Collection in the Library of the Royal College of Surgeons of England. Christophers BE. A Supplement to a List of the Works of Frederic Wood Jones, 1879-1954. Melbourne: BE Chris- tophers, 1988. Wood Jones F. Letter to Edward Ford, 1939. Original held by BE Christophers. Wood Jones F. The nature of the malformations of the rectum and urogenital passages. Br. Med. J. 2: 1630-4.

Documents

FREDERIC WOOD JONES AT SCHOOL AND AT UNIVERSITY