Rickman Godlee

Sir Rickman Godlee KCVO
Portrait of Sir Rickman John Godlee Wellcome
Born	15 February 1849 Upton, Essex, England
Died	18 April 1925 Whitchurch-on-Thames, Oxfordshire, England
Known for	First to surgically remove a brain tumour
Signature

Sir Rickman John Godlee, 1st Baronet

.

Early life

Godlee was born in

— whose biography he later wrote.

He was educated at a school in

before he began his medical education.

An expert draughtsman, and whilst still at

.

Medical career

He was admitted a Member of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1872 and four years later was elected to the fellowship, having in the meantime won gold medal at both his Bachelor and Master of Surgery examinations at the University of London.

After periods as house surgeon and house physician at

.

At the Epileptic Hospital, Regent's Park on 25 November 1884, he became the first to perform a surgical primary removal of a brain tumor after physician Alexander Hughes Bennett (1848-1901)^[2] had diagnosed the location using neurological findings alone.^[3]

In 1885 he was appointed surgeon at University College Hospital and Emeritus Professor of Clinical Surgery there in 1892. He served as President of the Royal College of Surgeons from 1911 to 1913 and of the Royal Society of Medicine from 1916 to 1918.

He was appointed Surgeon to the Household of

Family life

He married Juliet Mary Seebohm, a daughter of Frederic Seebohm, in 1891. After his retirement in 1920 they moved from London to Coombe End, Whitchurch-on-Thames, Oxfordshire, where he died at the age of 76 on 18 April 1925.

A tribute in The Times

The author of his obituary in The Times wrote:

"Rickman Godlee was a remarkable man. His Quaker upbringing and ancestry left their marks upon him. Scrupulously honest in thought and conscientious in detail, he took nothing for granted that he had not himself investigated. Quiet in manner, reserved in character, and rather sarcastic, he was apt to be under-estimated in early life by those who only knew him superficially. His sterling worth came to be recognised later, and he showed himself a firm but dignified and courteous ruler during his term of office as President of the Royal College of Surgeons. He was not only a good surgeon and a fine artist, but he was a

, which is so charming a feature of his Life of Lord Lister."

See also

• List of honorary medical staff at King Edward VII's Hospital for Officers

References

• Magnusson, Magnus, ed. (1990). Chambers Biographical Dictionary (5th ed.). Edinburgh: Chambers.

• Godlee, Rickman J. (1926). A Village on the Thames: Whitchurch, Yesterday and To-day. London: George Allen & Unwin.

Publications

• 'The Past Present and Future of the School for Advanced Medical Studies of University College London', John Bale Sons and Danielsson, London, 1907
• 'Lord Lister', Macmillan & Co, London, 1917
• 'A Village on the Thames: Whitchurch, Yesterday and To-day', George Allen & Unwin, London, 1926

Sources

Obituary in The Times (Tue 21 April 1925 — p.19, column 2)

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Rickman Godlee.

• Plarr's Lives of the Fellows of the RCS Online

Baronetage of the United Kingdom
New creation	Baronet (of Coombe End) 1912–1925	Extinct