Sue Young Histories

George Atkin 1815 - 1887

February 13, 2009

George Atkin 1815? - 1887? MD Edinburgh 1838 was an orthodox physician who converted to homeopathy to become the editor of the British and Foreign Homeopathic Directory, homeopathic physician at the Hull Homeopathic Dispensary, General Secretary of the Northern Homeopathic Medical Association, a member of the British Homeopathic Society and the Hahneman Medical Society, a member of the Hahnemann Publishing Society, and a member of The Association for the Protection of Homeopathic Practitioners and Students.

George Atkin, founded The British and Foreign Homeopathic Directory and Record in 1843 with John Chapman, Frederick Hervey Foster Quin, Robert Ellis Dudgeon, John Rutherford Russell, and James W Metcalfe (Jas Bell Metcalfe) and an anonymous ‘friend’. In 1853, George Atkin changed this publication to The Directory of British and Foreign Homeopaths and their Supporters to counter the decision to suppress of all mention of homeopaths and their supporters by the editors of the London and Provincial Medical Directory.

George Atkin practiced at 56 Prospect Place, Kinston Upon Hull, Yorks, and his successor was John Paul Cavenagh,

The fact that this aristocratic patronage of homeopathy in the UK extended well into the 1940’s, and beyond, can be easily demonstrated… the British and Foreign Homeopathic Directory lists the patrons of the dispensaries and hospitals. It reads like an extract from Burke’s or Debrett’s.

Some examples include: The Duke of Beaufort, Duke of Cambridge, Marquesses of Anglesey, Arthur Algernon Capell 6th Earl of Essex, John Gray 15th Lord Gray, Arthur de Vere Capell Viscount Malden, Richard Walter Hely Hutchinson 6th Earl of Donoughmore, Lord Ernle, Earl of Kintore, Arthur, Arthur Fitzgerald, 10th Lord Kinnaird, Duchess of Hamilton and Brandon, Francis Richard Charteris 10th Earl of Wemyss Lord Elcho, Henry William Paget Marquess of Anglesey, George Granville William Sutherland Leveson Gower 3rd Duke of Sutherland, Earls of Dudley, George Wyndham 1st Baron Leconfield, Thomas Egerton 2nd Earl of Wilton, William Coutts Keppel Viscount Bury 7th Earl of Albemarle, John Robert Townshend 1st Earl Sydney, Lady Radstock, Mary Adelaide of Cambridge Duchess of Teck, Duke of Northumberland, Earl of Scarborough, Earl of Dysart, Marchioness of Exeter, Sarah Waldegrave, Countess of Waldegrave, Countess of Crawford and Balcarres, Lord Headley, Earl of Plymouth, Lord Calthorpe, John Talbot 16th Earl of Shrewsbury, Lord Horder, Joseph Albert Jack Pease 1st Baron Gainford, Lord Moynihan, Lord Ernle, Lord Ampthill, Lord Home, Viscount Elibank and the Earls of Lichfield. And to this list we can also add numerous knights, barons, Army officers and clerics (and politicians and Members of Parliament Bankers and Industrialists).

George Atkin left a widow and one son,


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