Eimer 1452, BHM 2395.
55mm. Silver. By L.C Wyon.
Obverse with bust of John Hunter, reverse depicting two men assisting a stricken female in a hospital forecourt. Dated 1850 in exergue. Edge reads 'Heywood Smith. 1865'.
A small obverse edge bump otherwise attractively toned Good Extremely Fine and very rare. Housed in fitted case of issue which is embossed with 'St George's Hospital - The Thompson Medal - Prize - For Clinical - Medicine And Surgery - 1865'.
Hunter was a pupil of Cheselden at the Chelsea hospital and became house surgeon at St. George's Hospital in 1756. He was appointed surgeon-extraordinary to George III in 1776. The dies of this medal and a sum of money were presented by Mr. Serjeant Thompson, one of the treasurers of St. George's Hospital and a specimen is awarded annually to the most deserving pupil in classical science. Dr Heywood Smith (1837-1928) was a British gynaecologist, educated at Oxford, who became senior physician in the British Lying-In Hospital. The Science Museum holds many of Smith's former tools and the Royal College of Obstetricians and gynaecologist's hold an original copy of Florence Nightingale's book Introductory notes on lying-in institutions: together with a proposal for organising an institution for training midwives and midwifery nurses, published in 1871, which was originally gifted to Smith from Nightingale, showing he was at the forefront of Victorian medicine.