Surgeon born with ‘a scalpel in his hand’
Herbert Allingham’s skill as a surgeon prompted a medical colleague to describe him as ‘being born with a scalpel in his hand.’
His precision and speed in the operating theatre could be unsettling to the uninitiated and he was ‘cool, quick to decide and extraordinarily quick to carry out.’
One onlooker mistaking his non-nonsense approach as ineptitude declared themselves as ‘not thinking much of that’ after Allingham completed a colotomy in ten minutes.
He disliked too many instruments or theatre assistants and dismissed ‘pretty operations’ that didn’t have any long-term benefit to patients.
The football loving surgeon was a great advocate of simplicity and taught his students to put the wellbeing of their patients first.
Allingham’s career ended prematurely when he cut his finger during a procedure and contracted syphilis. He inadvertently passed it onto his wife who died. The grief stricken surgeon committed suicide a year later in 1904.