1718-1783

Scottish Anatomist, Obstetrician, Surgeon and Physician

Along with his teacher and fellow Lanarkshire Scotsman William Smellie (1697-1763), William Hunter was chiefly responsible for elevating obstetrics to the status of a rule-governed empirical science. Before his time it was generally the disrespected practice of ill-trained and superstitious midwives. He also made important contributions to surgical anatomy, forensic medicine, and cardiology.

Hunter was the seventh of 10 children of John Hunter, a farmer, and Agnes Paul Hunter. After attending grammar school in East Kilbride, Scotland, he entered the University of Glasgow in 1731. He made friends with William Cullen (1710-1790) and became his medical apprentice in 1736. On Cullen's advice, Hunter began anatomical studies under Alexander Monro primus (1697-1767) at the University of Edinburgh in 1739.

Hunter went to London to study obstetrics under Smellie in 1740. The following year he became the protégé of the distinguished obstetrician and anatomist James...