Hulme, Nathaniel

, an English physician, was born at Holme Torp in Yorkshire, June 17, 1732, and was taught the rudiments of medical science by his brother, Dr. Joseph Hulme, an eminent physician at Halifax, and afterwards was a pupil at Guy’s hospital. In 1755, he served in the capacity of surgeon in the navy, and being stationed at Leith after the peace of 1763, he embraced the favourable opportunity of prosecuting his medical studies at Edinburgh, where he took his degree of doctor in 1765. His inaugural thesis was entitled “Dissertatio Medica Inauguralis de Scorbuto.” Soon after his graduation, he settled in London as a physician, intending to devote his attention particularly to the practice of midwifery. This, however, he soon relinquished: and, on the establishment of the general dispensary (the first institution of the kind in London), he was appointed its first physician. He was also some time physician to the City of London Lying-in hospital. About 1774, he was, through the influence of lord Sandwich, then first lord of the admiralty, elected physician to the Charter-house His other official situations he resigned many years before his death, and withdrew himself at the same time in a great measure from the active exercise of his profession; but continued in the Charter-house during the remainder of his life. In March 1807, he was bruised by a fall, of which he died on the 28th of that month, and was buried at his own desire in the pensioners’ burial ground, followed by twenty-four physicians and surgeons, who highly respected his character.

Dr. Hulme was the author of several dissertations; viz. a republication of his thesis, with additions, 1768. “A | treatise on Puerperal Fever,” 1772. An oration “De Re Medica cognostenda et promovenda,” delivered at the anniversary of the medical society in 1777, to which a small tract was annexed, entitled “Via tuta et jucunda Calculum solvendi in vesica urinaria inhaerentem.” An enlarged edition of this tract, in English, appeared in the following year, under the title of “A safe and easy Remedy for the relief of the Stone and Gravel, the Scurvy, Gout, &c. and for the destruction of Worms in the human body illustrated by cases together with an extemporaneous method of impregnating water and other liquids with fixed air, by simple mixture only, &c.” 1778. In 1787 he was presented with a gold medal by the royal society of medicine at Paris, for his treatise on the following prize question, “Rechercher quelles sont les causes de i’endurcissement de tissu cellulaire auquel plusieurs enfans nouveauxnés sont sujets.” In 1800, Dr. Hulme instituted a series of experiments “on the light spontaneously emitted from various bodies,” an account of which was published in the Philosophical Transactions of that and the following year. He had been chosen a fellow of that society in 1794, and of the society of antiquaries in 1795. To the Archaeologia he contributed an account of a brick brought from the site of ancient Babylon. Dr. Hulme was also one of the editors of the “London Practice of Physic.” In 1791, a Mr. Obadiah Hulme died in Charter-house square, author of an “Historical Essay on the English Constitution,” and other tracts, probably a relation of Dr. Hulme. ¹