Sports Physician - Athlete 1866-1870

1866

James Holt Marsh (1866-1928) played as a three-quarter at Swinton rugby club, a town near Manchester. He is the only player to have represented two international teams, Scotland and England. He graduated from Edingburgh University and settled as a general practitioner in Manchester where he worked for nearly forty years.

1867

Alfred Allport (1867-1949) was a forward in the English rugby team and played for his club Blackheath before transferring to Barvarians Football Club in 1890. He also excelled in boxing and rowing.  In 1893 he was part of the eight-man Thames Rowing Club team that won that year's Thames Challenge Cup. As an amateur boxer, he fought in and won several gymnasium championships and was the heavyweight champion of Guy's Hospital. He graduated from the Guy's Hospital and specialized in Surgery. He worked in the Royal Army Medical Corps and operated at St Paul's Hospital in London.

1867

Edward Bromet (1867-1937) was a forward for Cambridge University, St. Thomas Hospital and his club Barbarians in the English rugby union. He was chosen to represent the English team to play fourteen games on the first official tour of South Africa, in which he scored ten tries. He graduated as a doctor and set up a practice in Redhill, Surrey and became a surgeon at the Reigate and Redhill Hospital. Bromet served Britain during the first World War in the Royal Army Medical Corps.

1867

Michael Joseph Bulger (1867-1938) was an Irish rugby player who played at Blackrock, Dublin University Football Club and Lansdowne Football Club. He was called up to play the international match between Ireland and New Zealand. He graduated from Dublin University and set up a medical practice in London with his brother Larry (1870-1928). Both brothers were also founding members of the London Irish club.

He became best known as a sports physician during the 1908 Olympics in London, where he helped the Italian Dorando Pietri (1885-1942) over the finish line in front of 75.000 spectators to win the marathon. Bulger is on the right on the photo, the Italian was later disqualified and the victory was eventually awarded to the American John Hayes (1886-1965).

1868

John Fegan (1868-1949) was a winger for Blackheath rugby club in the South East of London and also for the English team. At Blackheath he also played cricket at a high level and he also was a member of the Eagle Lawn Tennis Club at St John's College. He graduated in 1888 from St John's College of Cambridge and became a surgeon.  With the outbreak of the First World War, he joined the British Army and served in the Royal Army Medical Corps.

1868

Johannes van Dijk (1868-1938) won the bronze medal with the Dutch rowing team in the eights at the 1900 Olympics in Paris. Van Dijk graduated from the University of Amsterdam and settled as a general practitioner in the Dutch capital. In his active time he was affiliated with the Amsterdam student rowing club Nereus, which over the years counted many doctors among its members.

1869

Albert Elliott (1869-1900) was an English rugby union player who played for Cambridge University and St. Thomas' Hospital. In 1894 he gained his only international cap for the game between England and Scotland. In 1898 he completed his medical studies at St Thomas' Hospital in London and became the Resident Medical Officer at Queen Charlotte’s Hospital. He volunteered for service as a surgeon in the British Army during the Second Boer War in South Africa to fight the Africans. At the age of 31 years he died from a fever at Middelburg,Transvaal

1869

Edward Gleason (1869-1944) participated in the shooting competition of the 1912 Olympics in Stockholm. He won the gold medal with the American team in the clay pigeon competition. He graduated from the University of Vermont Medical School but specialized in Surgery at the University of Vienna. He started a practice in Boston and moved later to his hometown of Hyannis, Massachusetts

1869

Arthur Rotherham (1869-1946) played scrum-half at the rugby teams at Cambridge University, Richmond and the Barberians. In 1898 he was selected for the match of the English team against Scotland. In 1891 he graduated from St Thomas' Hospital in London and became a surgeon at Nottingham General Hospital. He later became an Assistant Medical Officer at London County Asylum in Purley, Horton Asylum and Manor Asylum in Epsom, before becoming a superintendent at the Dareth mental home in 1911.

1870

Larry Bulger (1870-1928), nicknamed ‘Fat Cupid’, played in the Irish rugby competition at Blackrock and Dublin University Football club. He was chosen for the British team that toured South Africa in 1896. For England, he also played the international matches against Scotland and Wales, in which he scored 19 tries and a penalty. Bulger was also Irish 220-yard sprint champion, and through his connection with athletics was a representative at the Sorbonne in Paris when Pierre de Coubertin suggested the creation of a modern Olympic Games. He graduated from Dublin University but set up a medical practice in London with his brother Michael (1867-1938). Together they founded the rugby team London Irish.

1870

Howard Marshall (1870-1929) played half-back for the English rugby squads Blackheath and Richmond. In 1891 he was called once for the national team, in the match against Wales he scored a hat-trick but England lost the match. He graduated from St. Bartolomew's, becoming a Surgeon and the Clinical Assistant in the Throat Department. He later became an Assistant Surgeon at Nottingham General Hospital, before becoming a General practitioner at Bexhill-on-Sea and Cirencester. From 1910 he became a surgeon at Cirencester Memorial Hospital. Marshall was the medical officer to the Royal Agricultural College in Cirencester and was also the civil surgeon to the 4th Battalion of the Gloucester Regiment. On the outbreak of World War I, Bingham Hall in Cirencester was turned into a Red Cross Hospital and Marshall was made medical officer in charge of it. For his services in Cirencester during the war he was awarded the Officer of the Order of the British Empire.

1870

Michael Riley 'Doc' Powers (1870-1909) was an American Major League Baseball player for Louisville Colonels, Washington Senators, Philadelphia Athletics and New York Highlanders. Before his professional career, he spent two seasons with the baseball team at the University of Notre Dame, where he graduated as a doctor. During his first game for the Philadelphia Athletics, Powers crashed his head into a wall while catching a ball. He died two weeks later of a peritonitis after having undergone several operations for the injuries sustained. The immediate cause of death was peritonitis arising from post-surgery infections.