Robert Christison, one of the twin sons of Alexander Christison, many years Professor of Humanity in Edinburgh University, was born at Edinburgh in July 18, 1797. After a complete education, in arts at the University, he finally chose the medical profession, and was for two years and a half resident assistant in the Royal Infirmary. Taking his M.D. degree in 1819, he spent the next eighteen months at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, London, and in Paris, where he worked in the laboratory of Robiquet at practical chemistry, and studied toxicology with Orfila himself.
When Dr. Christison was about to leave Paris, Dr. Gregory’s death led to a vacancy in the Chair of Medical Jurisprudence at Edinburgh, and Christison was proposed to fill it while still absent. It is significant of the state of knowledge that not one of the candidates besides Christison had any practical knowledge of chemistry. The influence of Lord Melville, however, who had been his father’s resident pupil when young Christison was born, was the determining cause of his success in the election.
At first students were very few, not half-a-dozen attending the earliest course. Christison devoted himself with characteristic energy to make his chair a real influence in the university. And here we may remark briefly on the extraordinary vigour of constitution which the new professor possessed, and retained almost till death. He could walk, run, or row better and with more endurance than any man of his time in Edinburgh, and that is saying a great deal. He made his new chair his primary object. Being an extremely neat and clean worker in the laboratory, his investigations soon became noted, and it was found, when he was called in to give evidence on matters of medical jurisprudence, especially in poisoning cases, that his mind was equally clear and accurate, and that he could give reasons for his beliefs which rendered his statements unimpeachable. From the famous trial of Burke and Hare in 1829 down to 1866 Dr. Christison appeared as a scientific witness in almost every case of medico-legal importance in Scotland, and in many in England.
“As a witness,” says the Scotsman (Jan. 28, 1882), “he was remarkable for a lucid precision of statement, which left no shadow of doubt in the mind of court, counsel, or jury as to his views. Another noteworthy characteristic was the candour and impartiality he invariably displayed, and which, backed as it was by the confidence that came of mature deliberation, rendered him almost impregnable to cross-examination. This was notably illustrated in the celebrated Palmer trial. Some of the medical witnesses for the Crown had got so severely handled by the prisoner’s counsel that the case seemed in danger of breaking down, but Christison had not been long in the box when the lawyers found they had at last met one who was a match for the subtlest of them: and so complete was the failure of all their efforts to discredit his evidence, that the case, by the time he finished, had assumed the gravest possible complexion.”
As a persevering experimentalist, Christison was daring even to rashness in making trials on himself. He thus tested the taste of arsenious acid, which was held by Orfila and most others to be rough and acrid, and which he proved to be rather sweet. He ate an ounce of the root of Œnanthe crocata , which had stood most poisonous in England and on the Continent; but the Scotch specimen at any rate did not poison Dr. Christison. A most striking risk was run in the case of the Calabar bean. He took a dose before going to bed, and found its effects resembled those of opium. Not satisfied, he took a larger dose next morning on rising, with the result of almost paralysing him. But he fortunately had a good emetic close at hand, a bowl of shaving water, and administering a large quantity, he was partially relieved. But much prostration remained, and medical assistance had to be summoned.
Christison’s principal services to the literature of his subject consisted in his work on Poisons, which was first published in 1829, and went through several successive editions, and in numerous memoirs and papers contributed to medical and scientific journals, some of which detailed improved chemical processes and tests for poisons, as those on “The Detection of Minute Quantities of Arsenic in Mixed Fluids,” “On the Taste of Arsenic, and on its Property of Preserving the Bodies of Persons who have been Poisoned with it,” and on the poisonous properties of numerous vegetable alkaloids.
In 1832 Christison, having raised his class to no fewer than ninety students, resigned his chair on appointment to that of Materia Medica, intending to become, in addition to a clinical teacher of medicine, an original investigator on the therapeutical action of remedies. But before he had got fully afloat in this, practice, for which he had not specially laid himself out, flowed in upon him, and prevented the realisation of his desire. He accumulated a fine museum of materia medica, and his lectures were very popular. But it cannot be said that he left his mark on medicine or therapeutics to the same extent that he did on toxicology.
Christison was eminently a lover of his university, and exceedingly conscious of its great merits. In numerous matters he was very conservative, and strongly resisted some modern views of pneumonia and fevers. He wielded great influence for many years in the administration of university matters. In 1838 and in 1846 he was President of the Edinburgh College of Physicians. From 1868 to 1873 he was President of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. From 1857 to 1873 he occupied a seat at the General Medical Council. After having been for many years Physician-in-Ordinary to the Queen in Scotland, Dr. Christison received a baronetcy in 1871, on the recommendation of Mr. Gladstone. In the same year his bust by Brodie was presented to the university, by general subscription among the medical profession.
In 1872 Sir Robert Christison completed his fiftieth year of active service as professor in the university, the only case of the kind that had ever occurred; and a large and enthusiastic assembly entertained him at dinner. Further honours still awaited him; he was in 1875 elected President of the British Medical Association at its Edinburgh meeting; and in 1876 he was selected for the Presidency of the British Association, a distinction which however he declined on the ground of his advanced age. He soon afterwards retired from active duty; but lived in considerable vigour till about Christmas 1881. He died on January 23, 1882, in his eighty-fifth year.