Dr John Tytler (1787-1837), Superintendent of the Native Medical Institution, Calcutta.

Dr John Tytler was a surgeon in the Indian Medical Service in Bengal who played a key role in the development of medical education in India at the beginning of the 19th century. He was a convinced orientalist, having taught himself Arabic, Sanskrit, Hindi, Persian and Bengali languages and translated many Western publications into vernacular languages. His career included work with Indian sepoy regiments, as a civilian surgeon and as superintendent of the Native Medical Institute. The end of his career in India was intensely frustrating for him as the Institute was replaced with the Calcutta Medical College where teaching was in English and he was excluded from a role in it. It is easy to ignore the important role men such as Tytler had in the development of Indian medicine.

John King, the Bristol surgeon and friend of artists and poets.

The Bristol School of Artists developed between 1800 and 1840 and was a collaboration between professional and amateur artists, one of whom was Dr John King. King started his professional life in Bristol as assistant to Thomas Beddoes where one of his colleagues was Humphry Davy and the three of them worked in the Pneumatic Institute, attempting to cure tuberculosis with gases. King subsequently became a popular general practitioner in Clifton and his correspondence with patrons of art, romantic poets and his friends gives much information about the social life in Bristol in the early part of the 19th century.