Among English surgeons of the century must be mentioned, first of all, Cheselden (1688-1752). wrhose name is inseparably connected with anatomy and pathology as well as surgery At first a warm advocate of the high operation for stone, his dexterity in lithotomy excited the wonder of his contemporaries. He published a treatise on anatomy, and one on the suprapubic section.
Alexander Monro, Sr. (1697-1767), of Edinburgh, was also eminent in both anatomy and surgery, and contributed more than any other one man to the success and reputation of the Scottish medical school. His sons, Alexander and Donald, and his grandson, Alexander (3d), w'ere equally celebrated in anatomy.
Charles White, of Manchester, is generally credited with having performed, in 1768, the first subperiosteal resection of the head of the humerus, although, as a matter of fact, this was not done until 1774, and then by Bent, of Newcastle. He also performed resection of the hip-joint upon the cadaver—another of the same name, Anthony White, having done the operation on the living subject in 1721. He invented the method of reducing dislocation of the humerus with the foot in the axilla,—a procedure that is ordinarily ascribed to Sir Astley Cooper; also operations for false joint by the removal of the involved surfaces of the bone.
It will be seen that the excision of the joints was peculiarly an English method, the elbow-joint having been first excised in 1758, by Wainman, and the knee-joint by Filkin, of Northwich. The man who permanently attracted the attention of surgeons to these new operations was Henry Park, a bold surgeon, who wrote in 1782. The merits of these methods were then soon forgotten, however, and were revived in the present century by Liston and Syme.
One of the best-known London surgeons was Percival Pott (1749-1787), who became especially eminent through his studies upon hernia, spinal disease, and diseases of the bones and joints; his complete chirurgical works appeared in London in 1771.
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William Hunter (1718-1783), of Scotch parentage, originally a theological student, and a pupil of Cullen, went to London in 1741, began to lecture on anatomy and surgery in 1746, and soon acquired a great reputation as a surgeon, obstetrician, and anatomist. He achieved enormous success in practice, and spent £100,000 upon his house, library, and private collections. The latter now form the Hunterian Museum in the University of Glasgow. His magnificent plates illustrating the gravid uterus required the labors of twenty years and appeared in 1774.