James Crichton-Browne

James Crichton-Browne (November 29, 1840 - January 31, 1938) was a British physician; he earned his medical degree at the Royal College in Edinburgh, and spent most of his career at the West Riding Asylum at Wakefield. It was here that neurologist David Ferrier performed his experimentation with cerebral localization.

Crichton-Browne was regarded as an expert on all aspects of medicine, public health and social reform. He supported a campaign for open-air treatment of tuberculosis, housing reform for the working-classes, and hygiene with respect to venereal disease. Along with Ferrier and neurologist John Hughlings Jackson, he founded "Brain", a journal dedicated to neurology and neuropsychiatry. He also assisted naturalist Charles Darwin with illustrated work when Darwin was writing his "Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals".

In 1883 he was elected Fellow of the Royal Society, and was knighted in 1886. He was an opponent of teetotalism, stating that "no writer has done much without alcohol". When he died on January 31, 1938 at the age of 97, he was acclaimed as "The Last of the Great Victorians".

External Reference:
 * Biography of James Crichton-Browne