Obstetricians

Although midwifery had been traditionally a female occupation, in the 19th century the rising middle classes came to prefer obstetric care to the traditional care from midwives, and doctors began to specialise in the field. The most famous of the day, Professor of Midwifery, James Young Simpson, lived at Number 22 before moving to nearby Queen Street. It was in Albany Street that he first used chloroform to ease a childbirth. (see Number 41). Almost all women gave birth in their homes but, as noted in the opening section on Jane Carstairs (see Number 41), some women leased houses or took lodgings to be close to their chosen obstetrician. A number of these were women whose husbands were employed in India and elsewhere, who travelled back to Scotland when pregnant to minimise the risk. It was lectures by the father of Dr Lewis Hay Thatcher (Number 13) that helped James Young Simpson develop his expertise in obstetrics, and with such a famous father in the field, it was no surprise that Lewis also became an obstetrician. He worked at the Edinburgh Lying-In Institution and also regularly advertised classes in best practice for nurses and midwifes. Thatcher’s son, Charles, became the third generation of the family to practise as an obstetrician. He worked for the Central Midwives Board for Scotland, and became the examiner in Midwifery and Gynaecology at Edinburgh’s Royal College of Physicians.

John Bowie (Number 19) was one of the Extraordinary Managers of the Edinburgh Lying-In Institution. Established in 1824, the Institution assisted in helping the births of ‘poor married women at their own house’ and offered ‘every requisite attendance, either by a Medical Gentleman or a Midwife, to Poor married Women; to furnish them with the necessary medicines; to supply the most needy of them with the temporary use of Bed Linen, Flannels, Blankets, etc, and with any other addition to the means of comfort and health that may be essentially necessary.’

Dr George Keppie Paterson (Number 19) was the assistant to Sir Alexander Simpson, the nephew of James Young Simpson and his successor as Professor of Midwifery at the University of Edinburgh. Paterson worked for many years at the Livingstone Dispensary in the Cowgate, where he was the consulting obstetrician and physician for maternity welfare. He joined the Edinburgh Medical Missionary Society in 1890, being for several years its treasurer and vice-president, and directly involved in many medical missions in North Africa, Egypt, Palestine, and the West Indies. He also served as the Vice-President of the Edinburgh Obstetrical Society.