Caesar (or Cæsar) Henry Hawkins FRS (19 September 1798 – 20 July 1884) was a British

surgeon In medicine, a surgeon is a medical doctor who performs surgery. Even though there are different traditions in different times and places, a modern surgeon is a licensed physician and received the same medical training as physicians before spec ...

Life

He was the son of the Rev. E. Hawkins and grandson of Sir Cæsar Hawkins, 1st Baronet (1711–1786),

Serjeant-Surgeon The Serjeant Surgeon is the senior surgeon in the Medical Household of the Royal Household of the Sovereign of the United Kingdom. The origin of the post dates back to 1253. Early serjeant surgeons were military surgeons who followed their king ...

to George II and

George III George III (George William Frederick; 4 June 173829 January 1820) was King of Great Britain and King of Ireland, Ireland from 25 October 1760 until his death in 1820. The Acts of Union 1800 unified Kingdom of Great Britain, Great Britain and ...

(see Hawkins baronets); and was brother to fellow physician

Francis Hawkins Francis Hawkins may refer to: *Francis Hawkins (Jesuit) (1628–1681), English Jesuit, child prodigy and translator *Francis Hawkins (priest) Francis Hawkins (c.1643- 19 February 1699) was an Anglican priest at the time of the Glorious Revolutio ...

and to

Edward Hawkins Edward Hawkins (27 February 1789 – 18 November 1882) was an English churchman and academic, a long-serving Provost of Oriel College, Oxford known as a committed opponent of the Oxford Movement from its beginnings in his college. Life He was bo ...

(1789–1882), Provost of Oriel, Oxford. Hawkins was born at

Bisley, Gloucestershire Bisley is a village and former civil parish, now in the parish of Bisley-with-Lypiatt, in the Stroud District, Stroud district, in Gloucestershire, England, about east of Stroud. The once-extensive manor included Stroud and Chalford, Thrupp and ...

. He was educated at

Christ's Hospital Christ's Hospital is a Public school (United Kingdom), public school (English Private schools in the United Kingdom, fee-charging boarding school for pupils aged 11–18) with a royal charter, located to the south of Horsham in West Sussex. T ...

, and entered

St George's Hospital St George's Hospital is a large teaching hospital in Tooting, London. Founded in 1733, it is one of the UK's largest teaching hospitals. It is run by the St George's University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. It shares its main hospital site i ...

, London, in 1818. He was surgeon to the hospital from 1829 to 1861, and in 1862 was made sergeant-surgeon to

Queen Victoria Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until Death and state funeral of Queen Victoria, her death in January 1901. Her reign of 63 year ...

. He was president of the

Royal College of Surgeons The Royal College of Surgeons is an ancient college (a form of corporation) established in England to regulate the activity of surgeons. Derivative organisations survive in many present and former members of the Commonwealth. These organisations ...

in 1852 and again in 1861 and delivered the

Hunterian oration The Hunterian Oration is a lecture of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, named in honour of pioneering surgeon John Hunter and held on his birthday, 14 February, each year. History The oration was founded in 1813 by the executors of th ...

in 1849. He was also President of the

Royal Medical and Chirurgical Society The Royal Medical and Chirurgical Society of London (RMCS), created in 1805 as the Medical and Chirurgical Society of London, was a learned society of physicians and surgeons, that received a Royal charter in 1834, and a supplement charter in 190 ...

as well as President of the

Pathological Society of London The Pathological Society of London was founded in 1846 for the "cultivation and promotion of pathology by the exhibition and description of specimens, drawings, microscopic preparations, casts or models of morbid parts." Its first meeting was he ...

in 1853. His success in complex surgical cases gave him a great reputation. For long he was noted as the only surgeon who had succeeded in the operation of

ovariotomy Oophorectomy (; from Greek , , 'egg-bearing' and , , 'a cutting out of'), historically also called ''ovariotomy'', is the surgical removal of an ovary or ovaries. The surgery is also called ovariectomy, but this term is mostly used in reference to ...

in a London hospital. This occurred in 1846, when

anaesthetic An anesthetic (American English) or anaesthetic (British English; see spelling differences) is a drug used to induce anesthesia ⁠— ⁠in other words, to result in a temporary loss of sensation or awareness. They may be divided into t ...

s were unknown. He did much to popularize

colostomy A colostomy is an opening (stoma) in the large intestine (colon), or the surgical procedure that creates one. The opening is formed by drawing the healthy end of the colon through an incision in the anterior abdominal wall and suturing it int ...

. A successful operator, he nevertheless was attached to conservative surgery, and was always more anxious to teach his pupils how to save a limb than how to remove it.

Works

He re-printed his contributions to the medical journals in two volumes, 1874, including papers on ''Tumours'', ''Excision of the Ovarium'', ''Hydrophobia and Snake-bites'', ''Stricture of the Colon'', and ''The Relative Claims of Sir Charles Bell and Magendie to the Discovery of the Functions of the Spinal Nerves''.

References

Attribution: * {{DEFAULTSORT:Hawkins, Caesar 1798 births 1884 deaths People educated at Christ's Hospital English surgeons People from Bisley, Gloucestershire Fellows of the Royal Society