William Willcox (toxicologist): Difference between revisions

Sir William Willcox (1870-1941) K.C.I.E., C.B., C.M.G., M.D., F.R.C.P. was an English toxicologist, physician and consultant.^[1]

Born in Melton Mowbray, his first degree was in chemistry, a subject which he then taught in a private school for four years – he also became a fellow of the Institute of Chemistry.^[1] He began studying medicine at St Mary’s Hospital Medical School in 1895 and qualified in 1900.^[1]

In 1904 he was made an expert forensic advisor to the Home Office, a role he held until his death and in which he trained his successors Bernard Spilsbury and Roche Lynch.^[1] In the first ten years alone he testified at the trials of Hawley Harvey Crippen, Steinie Morrison, Frederick Seddon and twenty-two other manslaughter or murder trials.^[1] He also advised on the death of Jessie Llewellyn of Llanelly in 1928^[2]

In 1907 he was made physician to St Mary’s Hospital, retiring from that role in 1935 – he also lectured and worked as a consultant there.^[1] He pioneered the TAB vaccine and served in the Gallipoli campaign of the First World War – for the latter work he was made a Knight Commander of the Order of the Indian Empire and a Companion of the Orders of the Bath and St Michael and St George.^[1] In the 1920s he began writing on barbiturate addiction.^[1]