# Dictionary of National Biography, 1912 supplement/Madden, Thomas More

​MADDEN, THOMAS MORE (1844–1902), Irish gynæcologist, son of Richard Robert Madden [q. v.] by his wife Harriet, daughter of John Elmslie, a West Indian planter, was born in 1844 at Havana, Cuba, where his father was the British representative in the international commission for the abolition of the slave trade. His West Indian origin was clearly discernible in his features. When his father returned to his practice in Dublin, the son was apprenticed to James William Cusack, a well-known surgeon there, but threats of consumption led to a long sojourn abroad. He completed his medical education at Malaga and in the University of Montpellier. In 1862 he qualified as M.R.C.S. (London). ​He then travelled in Africa and Australia. At length in 1865 he returned to Dublin to practise, specialising in obstetrics. In 1868 he became assistant-master of the Rotunda Lying-in Hospital, and in 1872 physician to the Hospital for Children. He was subsequently appointed master of the National Lying-in Hospital and obstetric physician and gynæcologist to the Mater Misericordiæ Hospital in 1878. In 1872 he was decorated by the French government for his share in raising the Irish Ambulance corps which served in the Franco-Prussian war, and was soon recognised in the United Kingdom and elsewhere as one of the foremost gynæcologists. He became F.R.C.S. (Edinburgh) in 18S2. He served as vice-president of the British Gynæcological Society (1878), as vice-president of Dublin Obstetrical Society (1878), as president of obstetric section of Royal Academy of Medicine of Ireland (1886), as honorary president of the first International Congress of Obstetrics and Gynæcology, held at Brussels in 1892, and as president of the obstetric section of the British Medical Association.
He died at his country house at Tinode, co. Wicklow, on 14 April 1902. In 1865 he married Mary Josephine, daughter of Thomas McDonnell Caffrey, by whom he had three sons and two daughters.
Madden was a voluminous writer, chiefly on medical subjects. Besides articles in medical journals and contributions to Quain's 'Dictionary of Medicine,' he published the following books, several of which ran through three editions, and were reckoned standard works: 1. 'Change of Climate in Chronic Disease,' 1864; 3rd edit. 1873. 2. 'The Spas of Belgium, Germany, France, and Italy,' 1867; 3rd edit. 1874. 3. 'Contributional Treatment of Chronic Uterine Disorders,' 1878. 4. 'Mental and Nervous Disorders Peculiar to Women,' 1883; 2nd edit. 1884. 5. 'On Uterine Tumours,' 1887. 6. 'Lectures on Child Culture, Moral, Mental and Physical,' 3rd edit. 1890. 7. 'Clinical Gynæcology,' 1893. He edited 'The Dublin Practice of Midwifery' and 'A Manual of Obstetric and Gynæcological Nursing,' 1893.
Madden wrote accounts of his father and family in 'Memorials of R. R. Madden' (1886); 'The Memoirs (chiefly autobiographical) of R. R. Madden' (1891); 'Genealogical, Historical, and Family Records of the O'Maddens of Galway and their Descendants' (1894).
[Madden's O'Maddens of Galway, 1894, and his Memoirs of R. R. Madden, 1891; Brit. Mus. Cat.; Men of the Time, 1899; Medical Register; Dublin Directories; Freeman's Journal, April 1902.]
D. J. O'D.