The Hunterian Oration is a lecture of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, named in honour of pioneering surgeon John Hunter and held on his birthday, 14 February, each year.

History

The oration was founded in 1813 by the executors of the will of surgeon John Hunter, his nephew Dr Matthew Baillie, and his brother-in-law Sir Everard Home, who made a gift to the Royal College of Surgeons of England to provide an annual oration and a dinner for Members of the Court of Assistants and others.[citation needed]

In 1853, the oration and dinner became biennial; it is held on alternate years in rotation with the Bradshaw Lecture. Delivered by a Fellow or Member of the college on 14 February, Hunter's birthday, "such oration to be expressive of the merits in comparative anatomy, physiology, and surgery, not only of John Hunter, but also of all persons, as should be from time to time deceased, whose labours have contributed to the improvement or extension of surgical science".[citation needed]

The RCS Oration is not to be confused with the Hunterian Society Oration given at the Hunterian Society.[citation needed]

Orators

19th century

20th century

  • 1901 Nottidge Charles MacNamara, The Human Skull in Relation to Brain Growth
  • 1903 Sir Henry Howse
  • 1905 Sir John Tweedy
  • 1907 Sir Henry T. Butlin, Objects of Hunter's Life and the Manner in which he Accomplished them
  • 1909 Sir Henry Morris, John Hunter as a Philosopher
  • 1911 Edmund Owen, John Hunter and his Museum
  • 1913 Sir Rickman Godlee, On Hunter and Lister, and on the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons of England
  • 1915 Sir William Watson Cheyne, The Treatment of Wounds in War
  • 1917 Sir George Henry Makins, The Influence Exerted by the Military Experience of John Hunter on himself and the Military Surgeon of Today
  • 1919 Sir Anthony Bowlby, British Military Surgery in the time of Hunter and in the Great War
  • 1921 Sir Charters J. Symonds, On Astley Cooper and Hunterian Principles
  • 1923 Sir John Bland-Sutton, John Hunter, his affairs, habits and opinions
  • 1925 D'Arcy Power, John Hunter as a Man
  • 1927 Berkeley Moynihan, Hunter’s ideals and Lister’s practice
  • 1928 Sir Holburt Waring, The Progress of Surgery from Hunter's day to ours
  • 1929 A. W. Sheen, Some Aspects of the Surgery of the Spleen
  • 1930 Ernest W. Hey Groves, Hero Worship in Surgery
  • 1932 Wilfred Trotter, The Commemoration of Great Men
  • 1934 Cuthert Sidney Wallace, Medical Education, 1760-1934
  • 1936 Charles Herbert Fagge, John Hunter to John Hilton
  • 1938 Eric Riches[citation needed]
  • 1939 Sampson Handley, Makers of John Hunter
  • 1941 Arthur Henry Burgess, Development of Provincial Medical Education Illustrated in the Life and Work of Charles White of Manchester
  • 1942 Eric Riches[citation needed]
  • 1943 William Francis Victor Bonney, The Forces behind Specialism in Surgery
  • 1945 George Grey Turner, The Hunterian Museum, yesterday and to-morrow
  • 1949 Henry S. Souttar, John Hunter the Observer
  • 1951 Sir Max Page,The Hunterian Heritage
  • 1953 Lionel E. C. Norbury, The Hunterian Era: Its Influence on the Art and Science of Surgery
  • 1956 Sir Henry Cohen, Reflections on the Hunterian Method
  • 1957 Ernest Finch, The influence of the Hunters on medical education[citation needed]
  • 1959 Sir Reginald Watson-Jones, Surgery is Destined to the Practice of Medicine[citation needed]
  • 1961 Russell Brock, Baron Brock on the Museum, Research and Inspiration of Hunter
  • 1963 Sir Stanford Cade, The Lasting Dynamism of John Hunter
  • 1965 A. Dickson Wright, John Hunter's Private Practice[citation needed]
  • 1967 Arthur Porritt, Baron Porritt, John Hunter, Distant Echoes
  • 1969 Leslie Norman Pyrah, John Hunter and After[citation needed]
  • 1971 Sir Hedley Atkins, The Attributes of Genius from Newton to Darwin
  • 1973 Sir Thomas Holmes Sellors, Some Pupils of John Hunter
  • 1975 Sir Rodney Smith, The Hunters and the Arts[citation needed]
  • 1977 Richard Harrington Franklin, John Hunter and his relevance in 1977
  • 1978 (250th anniversary): John Wolfenden, Baron Wolfenden, Hunter, Hippocrates and Humanity
  • 1979 George Qvist, Some controversial aspects of John Hunter's life and work.
  • 1981 Sir Reginald Sydney Murley, Peace and strife in Hunter's time
  • 1983 Not given due to death of speaker (Sir Alan Parks)[citation needed]
  • 1984 Anthony John Harding Rains, The continuing message
  • 1985 Donald Campbell[citation needed]
  • 1986 Peter John Ryan, Two Kinds of Diverticular Disease
  • 1987 Sir Geoffrey Slaney[citation needed]
  • 1989 Sir Roy Calne[citation needed]
  • 1991 John Blandy[citation needed]
  • 1993 Sir Miles Horsfall Irving[citation needed] (born 1935, professor of surgery at the University of Manchester)
  • 1995 John Alexander-Williams[citation needed]
  • 1997 H. Brendan Devlin[citation needed]
  • 1999 Jack Hardcastle[citation needed]

21st century

  • 2017 Lord Ara Darzi
  • 2019 Patrick Ronan O'Connell

See also