# Dictionary of National Biography, 1901 supplement/Duncan, James Matthews

​DUNCAN, JAMES MATTHEWS, (1826–1890), physician, fifth child of William Duncan, a merchant, and his wife Isabella Matthews, was born in April 1826 in Aberdeen. After education in the grammar school he entered Marischal College, Aberdeen, and graduated M. A. in April 1843. He began the study of medicine at the same college, continued it at Edinburgh in 1845, and, returning to Aberdeen, there graduated M.D. before he was twenty-one. He spent the winter of 1846-7 in Paris attending the lectures of Cruveilhier, Andral, Orfila, and Velpeau. He returned in April 1847, and soon after became the assistant in Edinburgh of Professor James Young Simpson [q. v.], whose friendship he had acquired in 1845. He assisted Simpson in his experiments in anaesthetics, and on 4 Nov. 1847 experimentally inhaled chloroform to the point of insensibility, and thus is entitled to a share in the discovery of its usefulness (Miller, Surgical Experience of Chloroform, 1848).
At the end of 1849, after some months of travel in attendance on the Marquis of Bute, Duncan began practice in Edinburgh, chiefly as an obstetrician. He became a fellow of the Edinburgh College of Physicians in 1851, and in May 1853 began a course as an extra-academical lecturer on midwifery. He soon attained considerable practice, and in 1861 was made physician to the ward for diseases of women in the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary. He read numerous papers on obstetrics, and from 1873 to 1875 was president of the Obstetrical Society of Edinburgh. He published in 1866 'Fecundity, Fertility, and Sterility,' the first exact inquiry in English into those subjects; a second edition appeared in 1871. The work is divided into ten parts (1) On variations in fecundity; (2) on the size of newborn children and the conditions affecting it; (3) on the production of twins; (4) on the laws of fertility in various ages, conditions. and races; (5) on the laws of sterility; (6) on fertility and fecundity considered together; (7) on the mortality of childbed; (8) on the age of nubility; (9) on the ​duration of labour; and (10) on the duration of pregnancy. All these are discussed in numerous chapters, and the exact method of treatment rather than any conclusions of great originality at once obtained a wide and deserved reputation for the book. A large proportion of the previous writings of obstetricians consisted of loosely arranged experiences or of advertisements of the writers' skill. Duncan's was obviously a scientific book, and he was ever after considered throughout Europe and America as an authority in obstetrics. In 1868 he published 'Researches in Obstetrics,' in 1869 'Treatise on Parametritis and Perimetritis,' and in 1870 'The Mortality of Childbed and Maternity Hospitals.' These books have all the same characteristic of precision, and so have his numerous papers in the 'Proceedings' of medical societies, and his subsequent writings 'Papers on the Female Perineum,' 1879; 'Clinical Lectures on Diseases of Women,' 1879, 1883, 1886, 1889; and 'Sterility in Women,' 1884.
In 1870, on the death of Sir James Young Simpson, Duncan was a candidate for the professorship of midwifery at Edinburgh, but was not elected. His steady increase of practice and reputation as one of the chief authorities in his subject showed that his profession and the public valued him more justly than the university court. In 1877 the staff of St. Bartholomew's Hospital, at a meeting at the house of Sir William Savory [q. v.], unanimously decided to ask him to accept the lectureship on midwifery, then vacant in their school, with the post of obstetric physician to the hospital. He was elected, and came to live at 71 Brook Street, Grosvenor Square, London. Such was his perfect straightforwardness and his geniality that in a few months he was as much a part of the place and of the staff as if he had been bred at St. Bartholomew's. He immediately passed the examination and became a member of the College of Physicians of London, and in 1883 was elected a fellow, and delivered the Gulstonian lectures. He was elected F.R.S. on 7 June 1883, and in the same year was nominated by the crown a member of the General Council of Medical Education and Registration. His lectures at St. Bartholomew's were clear and interesting and largely attended. His practice became very large, and his standing in his profession was higher than that of any earlier obstetrician. His just indignation was easily aroused and clearly expressed when aroused; his professional opinions were usually definite and stated in few words, and throughout life his universal kindness as well as his inflexible character was felt by all who came in contact with him. He was a warm admirer of William Harvey [q. v.], of William Hunter [q. v.], and of William Smellie [q. v.] In 1890 his health began to fail, and he did not finish his usual course of lectures. He went abroad in July, and after several attacks of angina pectoris he died at Baden-Baden on 1 Sept, 1890. He married, in 1860. Miss Jane Hart Hotchkis, and had thirteen children.
[Memoir by Sir William Turner in St. Bartholomew's Hospital Reports, 1890, vol. xxvi.; Works; personal knowledge.]
N. M.