Page:Dictionary of National Biography, Second Supplement, volume 1.djvu/265

 he allowed the advantages of chloroform anæsthesia to be demonstrated upon himself, his father being the operator. He began to practise in Glasgow, but in 1856 went to the Crimea as a civil surgeon. He returned to Glasgow at the end of the war, and was one of the first to practise there purely as a consulting surgeon. In 1860, when he succeeded his father as professor of anatomy in the Andersonian University, he was also appointed surgeon to the Glasgow Royal Infirmary. There he had as a colleague Joseph (afterwards Lord) Lister, who was led by the prevalence of septic diseases in the wards to the great work of his life the introduction of the antiseptic method of wound treatment. Buchanan thus had the earliest opportunity of becoming acquainted with methods whereby the practice of surgery was revolutionised. He soon became known as a bold and skilful operator and as a good teacher. He first pointed out (1865 and 1867) the possibility and safety of removing half the tongue in cases of cancer. He was amongst the earlier surgeons to remove the upper jaw (1864 and 1869). He gave reasons for preferring lithotrity to lithotomy in operating for stone in the adult male (1868) and he was the first (1863) to perform ovariotomy successfully in the west of Scotland. When the Western Infirmary was opened he was transferred thither, and held the post of professor of clinical surgery from 1874 until 1900, when he retired with the title of emeritus professor of clinical surgery in the University of Glasgow and settled at Stirling. There he died on 19 April 1905.

He married Jessie, daughter of Patrick Blair of Irvine, and left one son, Dr. G. Burnside Buchanan, assistant surgeon to the Western Infirmary, Glasgow.

Buchanan published 'Camp Life as seen by a Civilian' (Glasgow, 1871), and he re-edited and largely rewrote (Sir) Erasmus Wilson's 'Anatomist's Vade Mecum' (London, 1873; 2nd edit. 1880).

 BUCHANAN, ROBERT WILLIAMS (1841–1901), poet and novelist, born at Caverswall, Staffordshire, on 18 August 1841, was only surviving child of Robert I Buchanan (1813-1886) by his wife Margaret Williams (d. 1894), daughter of a socialistic lawyer of Stoke-upon-Trent. The father, originally a tailor of Ayr, was at the time of his son's birth an itinerant lecturer in support of Robert Owen's socialist scheme, and soon took to journalism in London. Buchanan went early to schools at Hampton Wick and Merton. At home he saw and heard his father's socialist friends, who included Louis Blanc, Caussidiere, and the Chartist champion of co-operation, [q. v.]. His father, on principle, denied him all religious training and inculcated hostility to religion.

About 1850 the family went to Glasgow, where the father for several years owned and edited the 'Sentinel,' the 'Glasgow Times,' and the 'Penny Post,' journals expounding his socialistic views. After attending a preparatory school, Buchanan went successively to a Rothesay boarding-school, to Glasgow Academy, and to Glasgow high school. In 1857-8 he completed his education by joining the junior classes of Greek and Latin at Glasgow University. An ardent devotee of the theatre, he revelled as a boy in Vandenhoff's presentation of King Lear, and made the acquaintance of various actors, among them the youthful Henry Irving, 'a quiet, studious young man.' A fellow-student at the university, [q. v.], became a close friend, and together they read Anderson's 'British Poets.'

Owing to his father's financial embarrassments, Buchanan went to London in 1860, being presently followed by Gray, who died next year. Their experiences of hardship and Gray's brief career are vividly delineated by Buchanan in ' David Gray and other Essays' (1868). In 1863 [q. v. Suppl. I], the novelist, who was an early Glasgow friend, stayed in Buchanan's lodgings in Camden Town on first coming to London (, William Black, pp. 38-41). Buchanan had already made some contributions to Glasgow newspapers. In London he obtained employment on the 'Athenæum' and other periodicals, and formed many literary acquaintances. Dickens accepted some contributions to 'All the Year Round,' and gave him helpful introductions to Edmund Yates and others. He sought the acquaintance of T. L. Peacock, G. H. Lewes who gave him practical advice George Eliot, Browning, and other prominent writers. Under Peacock's influence he produced what he calls his ' pseudo-classic poems,' 'Undertones' (1863) ( Robert Buchanan, p. 103;, Life of Peacock, 1911, pp. 164-5). After a weary and exacting struggle his work gradually won recognition. At length, in 1865, he published 'Idyls and Legends of Inverburn, which strongly appealed to Alexander Strahan the publisher