Alexander Pennycuik
Alexander Pennycuik (or Pennecuick) (1605-1695) was a Scottish military surgeon who became Surgeon General of the Scots forces in Ireland during the English Civil War. He was elected Deacon (President) of the Incorporation of Surgeons and Barbers of Edinburgh
Early life
Alexander Pennycuik was born in 1605, a member of a landowning family, which owned the estate of Penicuik, just south of Edinburgh.[1] When he inherited the estate of Romanno, north of Peebles in 1647, he sold the family estate of Penicuik and bought the New Hall[2] estate on the southern borders of Midlothian. In the minutes of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh he is often referred to as Alexander Pennycuik of New Hall.
Career
Like many Scots, he felt drawn to serve in the
Like most surgeons of his day he also acted as an apothecary and indeed took legal action against the father of a patient for non-payment of fees after he had treated the patient for scrofula (tuberculosis) 'with all kinds of inward and outward medicines'.[3]
He was
Later years and family
Despite spending most of his working life as a surgeon in conflicts, he went on to live to about 90. In his later years he was cared for by his son Alexander Pennycuik (or Pennecuick) (1652–1722) who had qualified and practised as a physician but found fame as a poet and naturalist.[4] His estate of New Hall was thought to be the setting for 'The Gentle Shepherd', Allan Ramsay's celebrated pastoral poem.
His son, in a fond posthumous tribute, described his father as:
"The oldest Aesculapian of his age…
Who flattered not the rich nor scourged the poor
From old forebears much worth he did inherit
A gentleman by birth but more by merit"
He was buried in the churchyard at Kirkurd/Newlands Parish Church near Peebles.[4]
References
- ^ a b c d Cresswell, CH. History of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh. Edinburgh, Blackwell, 1926. p27
- ^ Historic Environment Scotland. "NEWHALL (GDL00297)".
- ^ a b Dingwall, H. A famous and Flourishing Society. Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 2005. p63
- ^ a b Aitken, George Atherton (1895). . In Lee, Sidney (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 44. London: Smith, Elder & Co.