He won the Military Cross in 1918 due to his bravery serving in the Royal Army Medical Corps.
He was born in Patna, East Ayrshire in south-west Scotland on 6 May 1889, the son of Agnes Smith Campbell, a seamstress.
[1] His father, Stewart Campbell, was a teacher, but died either before David was born or soon after, leaving the family in difficult financial circumstances.
He joined the Royal Army Medical Corps in 1916 and won the Military Cross in 1918 whilst serving in northern France as an Acting Major.
[2] He returned to act as an assistant to Prof Ralph Stockman at Glasgow University and in 1921 became the Pollok Lecturer in Materia Medica and Pharmacology.
Here he made huge advances in the Aberdeen centre for medical research at Foresterhill, and was elevated to Dean of Faculty in 1932.