William Harvey

This biography is part of a series of historical obituaries, originally published in print. As products of their time periods, some biographies contain language which is inappropriate and offensive and present biased accounts of physicians’ lives and work that do not disclose unethical and discriminatory behaviour. As an establishment organisation, the RCP, its members, and the way they are written about, have often reflected societal power structures that favour dominant groups. We aim to redress these biases through ongoing work . William Harvey, MD - This distinguished physician, the greatest physiologist the world has seen, and the brightest ornament of our College, was the eldest son of Thomas Harvey, of Folkestone, Kent, by his second wife, Joan, daughter of Thomas Halke, of Haslingleigh, in the same county.(1) He was born at Folkestone on the 1st or 2nd of April,1578. His father (2) was a yeoman, "yeoman Cantianus," in substantial circumstances, and brought up a large family, ten in number, five of whom became merchants of note and substance in the city of London. Our future physician was placed, when ten years of age, at the Grammar school of Canterbury, and there imbibed his preliminary knowledge of Latin and Greek. In May, 1593, being then 16 years of age, he was entered a pensioner of Caius College, Cambridge. "Gul. Harvey, filius Thomæ Harvey, yeoman Cantianus ex oppido Folkston, educatus in ludo literario Cantuar. natus annos 16: admissus pensionarius minor in commeatum scholarium ultimo die Maii, 1593." (Reg. Coll. Caii Cantabr.) He took the first degree in arts in 1597, and, having selected physic for profession, left Cambridge about the year 1598, and, travelling through France and Germany, betook himself to Padua, then the most celebrated school of medicine in the world. Harvey then returned to England, was incorporated at Cambridge, and, settling in London, in November, 1604, married a daughter of Dr. Launcelot Browne") , a fellow of the College, and physician to queen Elizabeth. He was admitted a Candidate of the College of Physicians 5th October, 1604, and a Fellow 5th June, 1607. On the 25th February, 1608-9, having been strongly recommended by the king (James I), by Dr. Atkins") , the President, and several senior fellows of the College, Harvey was elected physician to St. Bartholomew's hospital. The appointment at this time was by way of reversion, and was to take effect on the resignation or decease of Dr. Wilkinson") , who then filled that office. Dr. Wilkinson died in the following summer, and Harvey was formally installed in the active duties of his office on the 13th October, 1609. He was Censor in 1613, and again in 1625, 1629. In 1615 (the week after St. Bartholomew's day) he was appointed Lumleian lecturer, an office then held not for a definite period only, but for life. Harvey commenced his lectures in April, 1616, and is generally supposed to have expounded on this occasion those original and complete views of the circulation of the blood, which have rendered his name immortal. Harvey's MS. notes of these lectures "Prælectiones anatomicæ universales per me Gulielmum Harveium, medicum Londinensem, anatom. et chirurg. professor, Anno Dom. 1616, ætatis 37: prælect. April, 1617," are in the British Museum.(4) It was not, however, until 1628 that he gave his views to the world at large, in his celebrated treatise entitled Exercitatio Anatomica de Motu Cordis et Sanguinis 4to. Francof. ad Mœn., having then, as he states in the preface, for nine years and more, gone on demonstrating the subject before his auditory at the College of Physicians, illustrating it by new and additional arguments, and freeing it from the objections raised by the skilful among anatomists. He continued his lectures for many successive years; in 1630 and probably in 1631 they were interrupted by his attendance on the Duke of Lenox "in his travels beyond the sea." They were undoubtedly so for some consecutive years anterio