Joseph Griffiths Swayne

He was ahead of his time in stressing asepsis, and deprecated long hair or beards for those involved in surgery or midwifery.

He died suddenly on 1 August 1903, and was buried at Arno's Vale cemetery, Bristol.

[3] He described a micro-organism that some have suggested was the "comma bacillus" which Robert Koch proved to be the cause of the disease in 1884.

[1] He took it to be a "fungus cell", and solicited help with verifying his research from microscopists including Arthur Hill Hassall and Edwin Lankester.

[4] George Busk, however, argued that the observation was of a uredo, that is, a fungal plant pathogen.

[5] Swayne published papers in medical journals, and Obstetric Aphorisms for the Use of Students (1856; 10th edit.