Cheselden

Cheselden, WILLIAM, a great surgeon and anatomist, was born in 1688, at Somerby, near Melton-Mowbray, and having in 1711 established himself in London as a lecturer on anatomy, was next year elected a Fellow of the Royal Society. He was afterwards appointed surgeon to St Thomas's, St George's, and Westminster hospitals, where he acquired great reputation, especially by his 'lateral operation for the stone' in 1727 (see LITHOTOMY). In 1728 he operated on a young man born blind, and the successful result of the operation did much to develop the theory of Vision (q.v.). He died at Bath, 10th April 1752. His four works included Anatomy of the Human Body (1713), long a textbook on the subject in England; and Osteo-graphia, or Anatomy of the Bones (1733). See an article in the Asclepiad (1886).