)[6] In 1821 McGrigor was elected the first President of the Medico-Botanical Society of London, established by Dr John Frost to catalogue medicinal plants.
[7] McGrigor introduced the stethoscope in 1821, set up field hospitals for those injured in action, and generally improved the standards of cleanliness and hygiene.
Sir James was created a Baronet on 30 September 1831,[8] and was appointed a Knight Companion of the Order of the Bath (KCB) in 1850.
McGrigor Barracks, built in the 1890s opposite the Cambridge Military Hospital in Aldershot in Hampshire, were named after him.
A huge granite obelisk by Alexander McDonald & Co was initially erected at Marischal College in Aberdeen to McGrigor's memory in 1851.