Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Craigie, David
CRAIGIE, DAVID, M.D. (1793–1866), physician, was born near Edinburgh in June 1793, took his medical degree in the university of that city in 1816, and in 1832 became a fellow of the Edinburgh College of Physicians. He never attained great practice, nor was famous as a teacher; but in 1828 he published a bulky ‘Elements of General and Pathological Anatomy,’ of which a second edition appeared in 1848. It shows that he had read many books on morbid anatomy, and the facts repeated from previous writers are often well arranged by Craigie, so that it may occasionally be looked into with profit. The part describing morbid changes in the pancreas is perhaps the best section of the book. Its defect is a want of that familiarity with diseased structures which can only be acquired in the post-mortem room. Craigie was physician to the Edinburgh Infirmary, but was more of a writer than of an observer. He became the owner of the ‘Edinburgh Medical and Surgical Journal,’ and edited his periodical himself. He wrote ‘Elements of Anatomy, General, Special, and Comparative,’ and in 1836 ‘Elements of the Practice of Physic.’ He helped Thomson in his ‘Life of Cullen,’ and published thirty separate papers on medical subjects. They remain almost unread, but are at least evidence of his persevering labour through many years; his ‘Morbid Anatomy’ is his best work, and deserves a place in every large medical library. After a long period of failing health he died in September 1866.
[Lancet, 8 Sept. 1866; Works.]