| MacCormac | William | | Civil Surgeon | He was the eldest son of Dr Henry MacCormac, MD, and was born at Belfast in 1836. Baronet Created, 1897; Kt, 1881; KCVO, 1898. Consulting Surgeon to the Forces in South Africa; President of Royal College of Surgeons of England and Member of the Court of Examiners, Royal College of Surgeons, and Examiner of HM Naval Medical Service. Sir William is covered with medical honours acquired in England, France, Italy, Prussia, Sweden, Portugal, Bavaria, Spain, and Turkey. He was created a baronet on the occasion of the Queen's Jubilee in 1897. Also awarded a civil KCB for the Boer War.
In our last issue a brief announcement was made of the death of Sir William MacCormac, which occurred suddenly at Bath, England, from heart disease. As one of the greatest British surgeons of the day, his career calls for a rather more extended notice. William MacCormac was born Jan. 17, 1836, at Belfast, Ireland. The son of a physician, he followed his father's profession, and received a
general and professional education at Belfast, Dublin and Paris. Though he held honorable professional positions before, his first general prominence was due to his observations during the Franco-German War of 1870, which he published in a work that has been translated into the German, French, Spanish, Italian, Russian and Japanese languages and made him the great authority at the time on military surgery. His
subsequent service in the Turko-Serbian War enlarged his experience in this line, and his recent connection with the surgical history of the Boer War is so recent as to be known to all in the medical profession. His standing with his confrères can
be judged by the fact that he was several times elected president of the Royal College of Surgeons, and the honours he received from his own and other governments are almost too numerous to mention. His connection with the International Medical Congress of 1881, to which he acted as Hon. Secretary-General, and to the success of which it is said he contributed more than any other man, brought him the honor of knighthood; he was made a baronet and surgeon-in-ordinary to the Prince of Wales in 1897. Besides his European honors, his work as a surgeon was recognized in this country by his election to the honorary fellowship in the American Surgical Association. At the time of his death he was consulting surgeon and emeritus lecturer in clinical surgery at St. Thomas' Hospital, the institution with which he was an active medical teacher for twenty years; his services and name were in demand in other hospitals and in various official positions. His death at the comparatively early age of 65 has deprived Great Britain of one of its most brilliant authorities in surgery. His best known works are "Notes and Recollections of an Ambulance Surgeon," 1871; "Antiseptic Surgery, Its Principles and Practice," 1880;. and "Surgical Operations," 1885.' His addresses, contributions to composite works and separate articles would make an extensive list.
Source: List of KCB (civil) recipients. Various sources | Civil Surgeon |
