1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Jenner, Sir William

JENNER, SIR WILLIAM, Bart. (1815–1898), English physician, was born at Chatham on the 30th of January 1815, and educated at University College, London. He became M.R.C.S. in 1837, and F.R.C.P. in 1852, and in 1844 took the London M.D. In 1847 he began at the London fever hospital investigations into cases of “continued” fever which enabled him finally to make the distinction between typhus and typhoid on which his reputation as a pathologist principally rests. In 1849 he was appointed professor of pathological anatomy at University College, and also assistant physician to University College Hospital, where he afterwards became physician (1854–1876) and consulting physician (1879), besides holding similar appointments at other hospitals. He was also successively Holme professor of clinical medicine and professor of the principles and practice of medicine at University College. He was president of the college of physicians (1881–1888); he was elected F.R.S. in 1864, and received honorary degrees from Oxford, Cambridge and Edinburgh. In 1861 he was appointed physician extraordinary, and in 1862 physician in ordinary, to Queen Victoria, and in 1863 physician in ordinary to the prince of Wales; he attended both the prince consort and the prince of Wales in their attacks of typhoid fever. In 1868 he was created a baronet. As a consultant Sir William Jenner had a great reputation, and he left a large fortune when he died, at Bishop’s Waltham, Hants, on the 11th of December 1898, having then retired from practice for eight years owing to failing health.