Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Begbie, James (1798-1869)
BEGBIE, JAMES (1798–1869), physician, was born in 1798 and educated at the high school and university of Edinburgh, where he took the degree of M.D. in 1821. He became F.R.C.S. Edin. 1822. He was the pupil, and afterwards for some years the assistant, of Abercrombie, whose instructions and example had great influence on his character and professional life. After many years' successful general practice, Begbie became in 1847 fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh, and devoted himself to consulting practice, in which he obtained great reputation and popularity. For several years he was physician in ordinary to the queen for Scotland. He died at Edinburgh on 26 Aug. 1869.
Begbie's writings consisted of a series of medical essays and memoirs, collected into a volume as 'Contributions to Practical Medicine,' 8vo, Edinburgh, 1862. They show considerable originality and practical ability. The most important is an 'Essay on Anæmia,' giving an account of the remarkable disease Exophthalmic Goitre (also called Basedow's and Graves's disease), of which Begbie was an independent investigator and one of the earliest. James Warburton Begbie [q. v.] was his son.
[Edinburgh Medical Journal, October 1869, xv. 380 ; Lancet, 1869, ii. 356.]