John Alexander Sinton

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For the Quaker industrialist and philanthropist, see John Sinton.

John Alexander Sinton
Malariologist

medical doctor, malariologist, soldier, and a recipient of the Victoria Cross, the highest award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British and Commonwealth
forces.

Early life

Sinton was born in

Queen's University, Belfast,[2] where he graduated in 1908 as first in his year.[3] He went on to attain degrees from the University of Cambridge (1910) and the University of Liverpool
(1911).

Sinton joined the Indian Medical Service in 1911, coming first in the entrance examinations, but before being posted to India was seconded as the Queen's University research scholar to the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine where his contact with Sir Ronald Ross may have influenced his later career as a malariologist.

Military career

Sinton was 31 years old and a

First World War. On 21 January 1916 at the Orah Ruins, Mesopotamia
, Captain Sinton attended to the wounded under very heavy fire and the citation to his VC reads:

For most conspicuous bravery and devotion to duty. Although shot through both arms and through the side, he refused to go to hospital, and remained as long as daylight lasted, attending to his duties under very heavy fire. In three previous actions Captain Sinton displayed the utmost bravery.[4][5]

Sinton later achieved the rank of

Order of St George and mentioned in dispatches
six times.

In 1921 he transferred from the military to the civil branch of the IMS which he continued to serve with until 1936.

Painting of Capt. Sinton attending a wounded soldier at Orah Ruins, Mesopotamia

Medical career

In July 1921 he was put in charge of the

Sir S. R. Christophers
.

He became Manson fellow at the

Second World War
, Sinton was recalled as an IMS reservist and commanded a hospital in India. At the age of fifty-five he was again retired, but was appointed consultant malariologist to the east African force and later to Middle East command, retiring with the honorary rank of brigadier in August 1943.

He then worked as consultant malariologist to the War Office, travelling widely to Assam, Australia, Burma, Ceylon, India, New Guinea, and the Solomon Islands, where his expertise in malaria was invaluable. Further military decorations resulted from this period, after which Sinton returned to Northern Ireland and retired to Cookstown. He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1946.[1]

Other activities

Sinton is the only

Deputy Lieutenant for County Tyrone and, in 1953, as High Sheriff of Tyrone
.

At Kasauli, Sinton met Eadith Seymour Steuart-Martin (1894–1977), daughter of Edwin Steuart-Martin and Ada May Martin (née Martin), whom he married on 19 September 1923. Their daughter, Eleanor Isabel Mary Sinton, was born at Kasauli on 9 December 1924.

His name is remembered in Sinton Halls, a student housing block at the

Queen's University, Belfast, where he sat on the senate and was a Pro-Chancellor. The Sinton Medical and Dental Centre at Thiepval Barracks, Lisburn is also named in his honour. Others honoured Sinton by naming three mosquito species, Aedes sintoni, Anopheles sintoni, and Anopheles sintonoides, one sandfly species, Sergentomyia sintoni, and one subgenus Sintonius of the genus Phlebotomus
, after him.

Stinton described and named the species Phlebotomus (Paraphlebotomus) alexandri.[7] and Prowazekia urinaria (now Parabodo caudatus).

He died at his home at Slaghtfreedan Lodge,

British Medical Journal
described him thus:

Sinton had an exceptionally quick, receptive, and retentive brain, but his greatness sprang not so much from his unusual intellectual gifts as from the simple qualities of absolute integrity and tremendous industry

His Victoria Cross is displayed at the

Army Medical Services Museum at Aldershot
.

References

  1. ^
    JSTOR 769490
    .
  2. ^ The Royal Society, Fellow of the Month June 2005
  3. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/61406. (Subscription or UK public library membership
    required.)
  4. ^ "No. 29633". The London Gazette (Supplement). 21 June 1916. p. 6191.
  5. ^ "No. 31340". The London Gazette. 15 May 1919. p. 6085.
  6. S2CID 1305307
    .
  7. ^ J.A., Sinton (1928). "The synonymy of the Asiatic species of Phlebotomus". Indian Journal of Medical Research. 16: 297–324.

Bibliography

External links

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