Robert Adams, who died 150 years ago on January 13th, “became known as the revered father of Irish surgery”, according to the entry on him in the Dictionary of Irish Biography by Helen Andrews. He was three times president of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI) and researched and published extensively in such medical areas as heart disease, arthritis and gout.
He was born in Dublin in 1791, son of Samuel Adams, a solicitor, and his wife whose maiden name was Filgate. We know nothing of his childhood or early education, but he was apprenticed first to William Hartigan and then to George Stewart, who were leading Dublin surgeons at the time, the latter surgeon-general to the British army in Ireland. He studied in Trinity College Dublin (TCD) from where he graduated BA in 1814 and subsequently earned the degrees of MA (1832), MB and MD (1842) and M.Ch., a new qualification of Master of Surgery (1861).
Most of his anatomical studies were done in the RCSI under the illustrious Abraham Colles and he was admitted licentiate (1816) and fellow (1818) of the college, after which he went to Europe to complete his medical and surgical training.
On his return to Ireland, he was appointed surgeon to the Charitable Infirmary, Jervis Street, Dublin and taught in some private medical schools before joining with the pioneering surgeon, medical reformer and philanthropist, Richard Carmichael, and Ephraim McDowel (who died of typhus at only 35) to establish the famous Richmond Hospital School of Medicine, Anatomy and Surgery in 1826 – renamed the Carmichael School of Medicine in 1849 – where he taught anatomy, physiology and surgery for many years.
The father of Irish surgery – Brian Maye on Robert Adams
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Following McDowel’s death, he and John MacDonnell applied for the position of surgeon at the Richmond Hospital, which presented the hospital’s board with a great difficulty as both candidates were of such a high calibre. Carmichael solved the problem by selflessly resigning, so that the hospital could employ both men. They contributed greatly to the development of the Richmond, Adams assisting MacDonnell to perform the first operation under anaesthesia in Ireland in 1847 (MacDonnell is regarded as the pioneer of Irish surgical anaesthesia).
Adams evolved an extensive surgical practice and was consulting surgeon to the Rotunda and Sir Patrick Dun’s Hospitals. It is for this reason that he is regarded as the father of Irish surgery, as referred to above, but Helen Andrews also argues that “his reputation, however, rests on his varied and extensive research and numerous publications”.
One of these was a long article entitled Causes of Diseases of the Heart Accompanied with Pathological Observations, which was published in 1827. It contained many original insights, for which he was not always credited afterwards, although he does not seem to have been bothered by this lack of recognition. Andrews regards his observations on apoplexy associated with heart disease as his most important; these were later developed by the pioneering cardiologist William Stokes and led to the “Stokes-Adams syndrome”, which became the first Irish cardiac eponym.
He was also very interested in diseases of the joints and published Chronic Rheumatic Arthritis of the Knee Joint in 1840. His 1857 book, A Treatise on Rheumatic Gout or Chronic Rheumatic Arthritis of all the Joints, was perhaps his most enduring publication.
Professor (and later regius professor) of surgery at TCD from 1861 to 1875, he was elected president of RCSI in 1840, 1860 and 1867, was president of the Dublin Pathological Society and was elected Member of the Royal Irish Academy in 1838. He belonged to many medical associations and became a senator of Queen’s University Belfast on its foundation in 1845. In 1861, he received the very prestigious appointment of surgeon to the queen in Ireland.
“Short and stout with black bushy hair, he was sociable, delighted his friends with his unlimited store of anecdotes and was a member of the Medical Society, a peripatetic dining club,” according to Helen Andrews. He also, seemingly, loved horses and always had a good specimen to pull his light carriage.
Although he suffered badly from gout, it did not affect his longevity and he was working up to shortly before his death from heart disease at his home at 22 St Stephen’s Green. He is buried in Mount Jerome Cemetery and the Irish Genealogy Projects Archives record that buried there also are his wife Mary (née Montgomery), who died on May 30th, 1851, aged 38, their daughter Elizabeth, who died on February 1st, 1855, aged six, and their son Samuel who died on July 12th, 1930.