Solomon Richards (surgeon)

He achieved fame by performing a tracheotomy in public for which act he featured in a satirical poem in The Metropolis.

[3] Richards was apprenticed to James Boyton, of St Andrew Street, an assistant surgeon to Dr Steevens' Hospital.

After the end of his apprenticeship in April 1781, he travelled to London, Edinburgh, and Paris, to study under the foremost teachers of his time.

He was appointed surgeon to the Meath Hospital in 1790 in succession to Arthur Winton,[2][5] a position he held for the rest of his life.

[4][6][7] After the death of Samuel Croker-King in 1817, Richards took over as visiting surgeon and governor to Dr Steevens' Hospital.

[2][5] In 1805, according to an account in The Dublin Quarterly Journal of Medical Science in 1859, Richards was asked to advise on a case of a newborn child that showed signs of syphilitic infection and soon after died.

The mother subsequently had a "putrid child" but Richards continued to advise against mercury on the grounds that the "venereal taint" would eventually wear itself out and the couple went on to have a number of healthy births as well as some that were premature or unhealthy.

[11] It was referred to by the author of The Metropolis,[12] probably the satirist William Norcott, as follows: Richards was said to be the "fattest surgeon in the United Kingdom", requiring him to enter a carriage sideways.