John Blackall

Immediately after taking his first degree he applied himself to the study of medicine at St Bartholomew's Hospital, and it was in its wards, while working as the clinical clerk of Dr. John Latham, that he made the observations on albuminuria which were afterwards stated and enlarged in his treatise on dropsies.

In 1813 he published his well-known Observations on the Nature and Cure of Dropsies, London, 8vo, of which there are four editions, and which entitles its author to a position among medical discoverers.

The further discovery of Richard Bright in 1836 of the constant relation between renal disease and albuminuria is based upon the observations first made by Blackall.

His progress from this period was rapid and uninterrupted, and for a long series of years he had a great practice in the west of England.

He died at Southernhay, Exeter, on 10 January 1860, and was followed to the grave in the burial-ground of Holy Trinity Church by a large body of relations and friends and the whole of the medical profession resident within the city.