| Administrative History | Joseph Hume was born in Montrose in 1777, the son of a shipmaster who died young. He was apprenticed to a surgeon at the age of 13 and studied medicine at Aberdeen, Edinburgh and London, then was found a place as a surgeon with the Honourable East India Company. He made his first voyage in 1797 and then worked in India for some years, taking an interest in local history and languages and assisting as military surgeon in the Mahratta Wars. He retired to England a wealthy man in 1808, and took to European travel and a study of English manufacturing. He became MP for Weymouth in 1812, but was not popular and did not last the year in the seat. He was re-elected in 1818 for the Border burghs, and spent the intervening time studying the problems of the working classes and of India. He remained in parliament almost constantly for the rest of his life, but represented a number of different English, Scottish and Irish constituencies. He was a radical and reforming politician and a busy committee man in Parliament and outside it. He died in 1855 after a number of years of ill health.
Joseph Hume was Lord Rector of Marischal College and University of Aberdeen in 1824, 1825 and 1828 and was awarded the degree of M.D. there on 25 March 1799. |
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