Booth Eddison 1809 - 1859

Booth Eddison 1809 - 1859, FRCS, Member of the College of Surgeons in Edinburgh and a Member of the Society of Apothecaries in London, he was appointed as a Resident Surgeon at the General Hospital in Nottingham, President of the British Medical Association,

At a time when orthodox physicians were proclaiming they would not be seen even talking to a homeopath, Booth Eddison was a ‘secret’ patient of homeopath James Manby Gully,

Ralph Barnes Grindrod, an allopathic physician who worked in Malvern nearby to James Manby Gully’s establishment, wrote to the British Medical Journal on 12.10.1861 to express his surprise to see allopathic physicians turn up for treatment at James Manby Gully’s establishment, and to consult with James Manby Gully over ‘difficult cases‘, and to bring and send their own patients to see James Manby Gully, all the while protesting against homeopathy…

Ralph Barnes Grindrod mentions the following allopaths by name – Booth Eddison, the President of the British Medical Association (a patient of James Manby Gully’s), Benjamin Vallance of Brighton (President of the Medico Chirurgical Society, Surgeon at the Sussex County Hospital), Thomas Spencer Wells (President of the Royal College of Surgeons of England), John Addington Symonds of Bristol (Vice President and President of the British Medical Association), Robert Lee and Sutherland (?George Granville William Sutherland Leveson Gower 3rd Duke of Sutherland) – and he says there were a great many more….

Booth Eddison was the son of John Eddison who died in 1812, leaving his widow to bring up 8 children under the age of 11 on her own. Booth Eddison’s mother was the neice of Rev. Abraham Booth 1734 - 1806, and she managed to rear and place all her children in good positions.

Booth Eddison became an apprentice at the General Hospital in Nottingham, finally passing out as a Member of the College of Surgeons in Edinburgh and a Member of the Society of Apothecaries in London, he was appointed as a Resident Surgeon at the General Hospital in Nottingham.

Booth Eddison continued his medical studies in Paris and in Dublin before he began his practice in Leeds and Nottingham.

Booth Eddison worked far too hard, as most good physicians did in his day. However, his health began to fail and he retired from work and lived in Devonshire, Italy and finally Madeira. The post mortem examination revealed that he died of tuberculosis, a major killer in the mid 19th century.