Henry Burton (physician)

Henry Burton FRCP (27 February 1799 – 10 August 1849) was a British physician and chemist, who identified that blue discolouration of gums, the eponymous Burton line, was a symptom of lead poisoning.

[2] Henry was descended from John Haliburton (1573–1627), from whom Sir Walter Scott, 1st Baronet traced maternal descent.

[3][6][7] Henry was educated at Tonbridge School;[1] and at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, at which he received the degrees MB, ML, MD, BS, and FRCP;[4][5] and at St Bartholomew's Hospital.

[3] In September 1825, he became Professor of Chemistry at St Thomas' Hospital,[4][5][1] where he became Senior Physician.

[5][8][9] Henry Burton married Mary Elizabeth, who was the daughter of William Poulton of Maidenhead, at St. George's, Bloomsbury, in 1826.