Obituary, Joseph Coats, M.D., Professor of Pathology, University of Glasgow / [by W.T.G.].

  • William Tennant Gairdner
Date:
1899
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Obituary, Joseph Coats, M.D., Professor of Pathology, University of Glasgow / [by W.T.G.]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    For a few years Dr, Coats attempted to combine pathological duties with a specialism in practice; and being a proficient in laryngoscopy almost from its earliest period, he had a not in- considerable success in what is now a much more largely de- veloped field of lucrative practice. But his object never was money-making chiefiy, or indeed at all more than was neces- sary, and in the end pathology claimed his quite undivided allegiance. As a man, however, of wide sympathies both in religion and politics he was not averse from extraprofessional discussions, though rarely obtrusive and never combative or noisy. He was a Broad Churchman among the Baptists, and often maintained to the writer that in that comparatively small sect there was more religious breadth (or the opportunity for it) than in most of the greater communions whether in England or in Scotland. In the core of him he was an in- tensely^ religious man, and his political sympathies were with the Liberal Unionists. His family life was altogether admir- able. He is survived by a widow and two girls about 14 and 16 years of age. Dr. Coats was the son of Mr. William Coats, of Paisley, a somewhat distant relative, we believe, of the two large families of that name who have so largely conduced to the prosperity of that borough by their world-wide reputation as thread manufacturers, Joseph Caats was born in 1846, and had therefore only attained his 52nd year at the time of his death. He was educated at the excellent Neilson school in his native town, and afterwards passed through the classes in arts and medicine in Glasgow University, graduating as M.B. in 1867 with first class honours. Thereafter he went, as above stated, to Germany, and in Ludwig’s laboratory did some original research in relation to the heart, which was pub- lished in German in i86g. At a considerably later period he went over to Paris to look carefully into Pasteur’s work, and, from his close association with Ixird Lister during the period of pupilage when Lister was Professor in Glasgow and was working out the principles and details of antiseptic surgery, Coats may be said to have been at the very inception of that great philosophical impulse to the art of healing. He took his higher degree of M.D. in 1870, and almost immediately there- after began the work of his life, as it has been above narrated in brief summary. He became Pathologist to the Itoyal, and aftenvards to the Western Infirmary, and to the Sick Children’s Hospital, and latterly was employed also in medico-legal business. He was a member of most of the medical societies related to his subject in Glasgow and in London, and was one of the initiators of the Glasgow Pathological and Clinical Society. In 1888 when the British Medical Association met in Glasgow he was Vice- President, and in the following year President of the Section of Pathology. Indeed, in every kind of medical in- stitution with which he was connected—academic, social, or professional—his inlluence was always felt, and always to the advantage of medical fellowship and good fellowship. He was the founder of the University Club in Glasgow, and it gave a most pathetic close to his good work done in this world when, on the day before his death, at a house dinner of compliment and congratulation to Principal Story, a mes- sage was received from Professor Coats, as the Honorary Chairman of the club, to the effect that although somewhat better, he could not possibly be present at the dinner, but
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