Marshall Hall
FRS (18 February 1790 – 11 August 1857) was an English physician,
physiologist
Physiology (; ) is the scientific study of functions and mechanisms in a living system. As a sub-discipline of biology, physiology focuses on how organisms, organ systems, individual organs, cells, and biomolecules carry out the chemical ...
and early
neurologist
Neurology (from el, νεῦρον (neûron), "string, nerve" and the suffix -logia, "study of") is the branch of medicine dealing with the diagnosis and treatment of all categories of conditions and disease involving the brain, the spinal ...
. His name is attached to the theory of
reflex arc mediated by the
spinal cord
The spinal cord is a long, thin, tubular structure made up of nervous tissue, which extends from the medulla oblongata in the brainstem to the lumbar region of the vertebral column (backbone). The backbone encloses the central canal of the spin ...
, to a method of
resuscitation
Resuscitation is the process of correcting physiological disorders (such as lack of breathing or heartbeat) in an acutely ill patient. It is an important part of intensive care medicine, anesthesiology, trauma surgery and emergency medicine. ...
of
drowned people, and to the elucidation of function of
capillary
A capillary is a small blood vessel from 5 to 10 micrometres (μm) in diameter. Capillaries are composed of only the tunica intima, consisting of a thin wall of simple squamous endothelial cells. They are the smallest blood vessels in the body: ...
vessels.
Biography
Hall was born on 18 February 1790 at
Basford, near
Nottingham
Nottingham ( , locally ) is a city and unitary authority area in Nottinghamshire, East Midlands, England. It is located north-west of London, south-east of Sheffield and north-east of Birmingham. Nottingham has links to the legend of Robi ...
, England, where his father, Robert Hall, was a cotton manufacturer. He was a brother of the inventor
Samuel Hall. Having attended the Rev. J. Blanchard's academy at Nottingham, he entered a chemists shop at
Newark-on-Trent
Newark-on-Trent or Newark () is a market town and civil parish in the Newark and Sherwood district in Nottinghamshire, England. It is on the River Trent, and was historically a major inland port. The A1 road bypasses the town on the line of t ...
, and in 1809 began to study medicine at
Edinburgh University
The University of Edinburgh ( sco, University o Edinburgh, gd, Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in post-nominals) is a public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Granted a royal charter by King James VI i ...
. In 1811 he was elected senior president of the
Royal Medical Society
The Royal Medical Society (RMS) is a society run by students at the University of Edinburgh Medical School, Scotland. It claims to be the oldest medical society in the United Kingdom although this claim is also made by the earlier London-based ...
; the following year he took the M.D. degree, and was immediately appointed resident house physician to the
Edinburgh Royal Infirmary. This appointment he resigned after two years, when he visited Paris and its medical schools, and, on a walking tour, those also of
Berlin
Berlin is Capital of Germany, the capital and largest city of Germany, both by area and List of cities in Germany by population, by population. Its more than 3.85 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European U ...
and
Göttingen
Göttingen (, , ; nds, Chöttingen) is a college town, university city in Lower Saxony, central Germany, the Capital (political), capital of Göttingen (district), the eponymous district. The River Leine runs through it. At the end of 2019, t ...
.
In 1817, when he settled at Nottingham, he published his ''Diagnosis'', and in 1818 he wrote the ''Mimoses'', a work on the affections denominated bilious, nervous, &c. The next year he was elected a fellow of the
Royal Society of Edinburgh
The Royal Society of Edinburgh is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity that operates on a wholly independent and non-partisan basis and provides public benefit throughout Scotland. It was established i ...
, and in 1825 he became physician to the Nottingham general hospital. In 1826 he removed to London, and in the following year he published his ''Commentaries on the More Important Diseases of Females''.
In 1835 (Principles of Investigation in Physiology), he outlined five principles to govern
animal experimentation
Animal testing, also known as animal experimentation, animal research, and ''in vivo'' testing, is the use of non-human animals in experiments that seek to control the variables that affect the behavior or biological system under study. This ...
.
#An experiment should never be performed if the necessary information could be obtained by observations
#No experiment should be performed without a clearly defined and obtainable, objective
#Scientists should be well-informed about the work of their predecessors and peers to avoid unnecessary repetition of an experiment
#Justifiable experiments should be carried out with the least possible infliction of suffering (often through the use of lower, less sentient animals)
#Every experiment should be performed under circumstances that would provide the clearest possible results, thereby diminishing the need for repetition of experiments.
In 1836 he issued his ''Observations on Blood-letting Founded on Researches on the Morbid and Curative Effects of Loss of Blood'', denouncing the widespread practice of
bloodletting
Bloodletting (or blood-letting) is the withdrawal of blood from a patient to prevent or cure illness and disease. Bloodletting, whether by a physician or by leeches, was based on an ancient system of medicine in which blood and other bodily flu ...
, which was acknowledged by the medical profession to be of vast practical value, and in 1831 his ''Experimental Essay on the Circulation of the Blood in the Capillary Vessels'', in which he was the first to show that the
capillaries
A capillary is a small blood vessel from 5 to 10 micrometres (μm) in diameter. Capillaries are composed of only the tunica intima, consisting of a thin wall of simple squamous endothelial cells. They are the smallest blood vessels in the body: ...
are intermediate channels between the
arteries
An artery (plural arteries) () is a blood vessel in humans and most animals that takes blood away from the heart to one or more parts of the body (tissues, lungs, brain etc.). Most arteries carry oxygenated blood; the two exceptions are the pul ...
and the
veins
Veins are blood vessels in humans and most other animals that carry blood towards the heart. Most veins carry deoxygenated blood from the tissues back to the heart; exceptions are the pulmonary and umbilical veins, both of which carry oxygenated ...
and put the blood in contact with
biological tissue
In biology, tissue is a biological organizational level between cells and a complete organ. A tissue is an ensemble of similar cells and their extracellular matrix from the same origin that together carry out a specific function. Organs are ...
s. In the following year he read before the Royal Society a paper ''On the Inverse Ratio which Subsists between Respiration and Irritability in the Animal Kingdom''.
His most important work in physiology was concerned with the theory of
reflex action
In biology, a reflex, or reflex action, is an involuntary, unplanned sequence or action and nearly instantaneous response to a stimulus.
Reflexes are found with varying levels of complexity in organisms with a nervous system. A reflex occurs ...
, embodied in a paper ''On the Reflex Function of the Medulla Oblongata and the Medulla Spinalis'' (1833), which was supplemented in 1837 by another ''On the True Spinal Marrow, and the Excito-motor System of Nerves''. In this theory, he stated that the
spinal cord
The spinal cord is a long, thin, tubular structure made up of nervous tissue, which extends from the medulla oblongata in the brainstem to the lumbar region of the vertebral column (backbone). The backbone encloses the central canal of the spin ...
is comprised by a chain of units that functions as an independent
reflex arcs, and their activity integrates
sensory
Sensory may refer to:
Biology
* Sensory ecology, how organisms obtain information about their environment
* Sensory neuron, nerve cell responsible for transmitting information about external stimuli
* Sensory perception, the process of acquiri ...
and
motor nerve
A motor nerve is a nerve that transmits motor signals from the central nervous system (CNS) to the muscles of the body. This is different from the motor neuron, which includes a cell body and branching of dendrites, while the nerve is made up of ...
s at the segment of the spinal cord from which these nerves originate. He proposed in addition that those arcs are interconnected and interacting in the production of coordinated
movement.
The reflex function excited great attention on the continent of Europe, though in England some of his papers were refused publication by the
Royal Society
The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, r ...
. Hall thus became the authority on the multiform deranged states of health referable to an abnormal condition of the
nervous system
In Biology, biology, the nervous system is the Complex system, highly complex part of an animal that coordinates its Behavior, actions and Sense, sensory information by transmitting action potential, signals to and from different parts of its ...
, and he gained a large practice.
Hall also published books on neurological diseases including stroke (apoplexy) and epilepsy.
In ''Asphyxia, its Rationale and its Remedy'' (1856), Hall developed a technique for preventing victims of drowning by freeing their
respiratory
The respiratory system (also respiratory apparatus, ventilatory system) is a biological system consisting of specific organs and structures used for gas exchange in animals and plants. The anatomy and physiology that make this happen varies gre ...
airway
The respiratory tract is the subdivision of the respiratory system involved with the process of respiration in mammals. The respiratory tract is lined with respiratory epithelium as respiratory mucosa.
Air is breathed in through the nose to ...
and by providing immediate
ventilation, as the initial steps in
resuscitation
Resuscitation is the process of correcting physiological disorders (such as lack of breathing or heartbeat) in an acutely ill patient. It is an important part of intensive care medicine, anesthesiology, trauma surgery and emergency medicine. ...
.
He was elected as a member to the
American Philosophical Society
The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communi ...
in 1853.
He died at
Brighton of a throat infection, aggravated by lecturing, on 11 August 1857 and was buried in Nottingham. One of his grandsons was the musician
Marshall Hall. ;)
Religious views
Hall was a devout Christian who believed in the
divinity of Christ. A collection of his religious thoughts on his journals and letters was collected by his widow in the biographical book ''Memoirs of Marshall Hall, by his widow''. There, he is quoted speaking about Christ:
In his treatise ''On the diseases and derangements of the nervous system'' (1841), he evoked the
design argument
The teleological argument (from ; also known as physico-theological argument, argument from design, or intelligent design argument) is an argument for the existence of God or, more generally, that complex functionality in the natural world wh ...
, stating about the physiological activity of the body:
Abolitionism
Hall was also an
abolitionist
Abolitionism, or the abolitionist movement, is the movement to end slavery. In Western Europe and the Americas, abolitionism was a historic movement that sought to end the Atlantic slave trade and liberate the enslaved people.
The British ...
. When he travelled to the United States, in his later years, he was shocked by what he saw, and was shocked at how slavery was sanctioned in the States. An admirer of
William Wilberforce
William Wilberforce (24 August 175929 July 1833) was a British politician, philanthropist and leader of the movement to abolish the slave trade. A native of Kingston upon Hull, Yorkshire, he began his political career in 1780, eventually bec ...
, he wrote ''The two-fold slavery of the United States; with a project of self-emancipation'' (1854), where he denounced the slave system and spoke about "a second slavery" of
racial prejudice
Racism is the belief that groups of humans possess different behavioral traits corresponding to inherited attributes and can be divided based on the superiority of one race over another. It may also mean prejudice, discrimination, or antagonis ...
. He set then his opinion on slavery, stating:
In his book, he proposed as project of emancipation that African-American people continue to produce cotton, sugar and rice, but to freely help and prosper themselves. On the same religious grounds, he questioned the permission of polygamy in the US and insisted that imposing the slavery system and denying marriage to black people was a
sin which caused a "deprivation of education, of holy marriage, of parental rights".:
He believed that every slaveholder had a "guilt of sin against God, and of sin against his fellow-man"
[Hall, Charlotte; Hall, Marshall (1861). ''Memoirs of Marshall Hall, by his widow''. London : R. Bentley. p. 322] and insisted that there was no credible hypothesis to rationally support white supremacy, stating:
Notes
References
*
*
*
External links
Trauma resuscitation
Marshall Hall's ''The principles of diagnosis'' (New York, 1839)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hall, Marshall
1790 births
1857 deaths
People from Basford, Nottinghamshire
British physiologists
British neuroscientists
History of neuroscience
Alumni of the University of Edinburgh
Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh
Fellows of the Royal Society
English Christians
British abolitionists
Christian abolitionists