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The South Australian Corps of Veterans
Another group on the lawn
Surgeon-Major Henry Benjamin Hinton, born Swansea, Portsmouth, United Kingdom, 7th March 1813. On Friday, March 7, 1913, on his one hundredth birthday he was the oldest living officer in the Empire and the oldest living member of the Royal College of Surgeons. He died in 1916 at the age of 103. Surgeon-Major Henry Benjamin Hinton's story is told from his journal, written in January 1887, and newspaper clippings held by his great great grandson, Philip Bramley.
My 100th Year
The South Australian Corps of Veterans
Celebrating my Centenary
Another group on the lawn
Surgeon-Major Hinton's Centenary
From Faulding's Medical and Home Journal - March 20, 1913
Our Patriotic Page - Surgeon-Major Hinton's Centenary
Although one hundred years is more than the allotted span of life, Surgeon-Major Hinton has achieved them, In the October number of our journal we presented a short sketch of the career of this truly remarkable man, who on Friday, March 7, 1913, was in the proud position of being able to receive his many friends on the occasion of his having reached one hundred years. He is not only the oldest living officer in the Empire, but also the oldest living member of the Royal College of Surgeons.
Dr Hinton's family could not, of course, allow the attainment of his hundredth birthday to pass without some especial marking of the event.
His grand-daughter, Miss Beatrice Moffatt, who is his especial attendant, issued invitations to old friends to attend a reception at "Konetta", North Adelaide, on the afternoon of the anniversary of the reaching of the century.
Surgeon-Major Hinton belongs to the South Australian Corps of Veterans, and to the members of that body Miss Moffatt issued special invitations.
Amongst those present were :
Mr. L.H. Sholl, C.M.G; I.S.O (Under Secretary and son in law to Surgeon-Major Hinton).
Mrs Sholl, (daughter)
Colonel LeMesurier (District Military Commandant)
Dr. A.A. Lendon
Dr. W.T. Hayward
Dr. Newland
Dr. Violet Plummer
Mr. W.J.P. Giddings (Chairman of the Corps of Veterans) and Miss Bidmead B.B.C
T. Arnold (color-sergeant 4th Foot, Zulu War, 1879)
W.W. Ball (11th Hussars, Egypt, 1882)
H.A. Braham (Royal Navy, Abyssinia, 1868; Afghanistan, 1878)
A.H. Bryson (Indian Civil Service, Defence of Lucknow, 1856)
H.J. Burton (Royal Navy, Egypt, 1882)
Major W. DePassey (17th Lancers, Zulu War, 1879; 2nd Boer War).
S. Ellis (Royal Navy, Crimea)
M. Fillmore (corporal, Cape Mounted Rifles, Basutoland, 1880-1)
H. Fraser (Black Watch, Egypt, 1882)
H.J. Giddon (sergeant, 97th Foot, New Zealand)
T. Hanley (sergeant, Gordon Highlanders, Afghanistan, 1878; 1st and 2nd Boer Wars)
W. Isley (Army Works Corps, Crimea)
J. Talbot (65th Foot, New Zealand)
R. Walker (Land Transport Corps, Crimea)
R. Watson (38th Foot, Crimea and (Indian) Mutiny)
J. West (Coldstream Guards, Egypt, 1882)
J. H. White (warrant officer, Royal Navy, C
hina, 1857)
"Dr Lendon proposed a toast and recounted some highlights of Surgeon-Major Hinton's life."
"We have met on a very unique occasion. It is very seldom that a private hospital is the place selected for a garden party, but it is also very seldom that a private hospital can boast of a patient who hasd attained to his 100th birtdhay, like our friend, Sugeon-Major Hinton. I should like you for a moment to carry your minds back to this day one century ago. At that date you will remember poor old George III was nominally King, but the "first gentleman in Europe" was Regent. Then Napoleon was still a bugbear, and Wellington was to Englishmen what Roberts and Kitchener combined are to us at the present day. When baby Hinton was cutting his last teeth 'Boney' had just escaped from Elba.
His boyhood was uneventful, and as a young man he was apprenticed to a relative in the book publishing trade, but the glamour of India was cast over him from his reading, and he sought his father's permission to study medicine with a view to trying his fortune in that country.
After becoming a member of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in May, 1835, had made three voyages in an East Indiaman to Calcutta. These ships were considered the acme of perfection in travelling in those days, though the passage usually took four months. Through the kind services of his captain he obtained a nomination as an assitant-surgeon in the Hon. East India Company's Bengal Army, and on his arrival in India he was gazetted on May 27, 1839.
His first interesting duty was to attend a parade for the purpose of flogging a soldier for some trivial offence. We seem to be able to do without flogging in the army and navy nowadays, (A voice, 'Quite right.')
A native regiment being detailed for Burmah, he volunteered for service with it, and a second time went in a civil capacity, picking up the usual fevers of that country. He was invalided back to India and on his recovery ordered to join the army of Gwalior. Nowadays I suppose one could reach that frowning fortress by spending a couple of nights in the train, but in 1843 it meant a tedious journey by boat and by ekka.
It is not to be wondered at then that he arrived only in time to hear the distant guns firing at the battle of Maharajpur, and to attend the wounded afterwards.
The power of the Mahrattas was broken in this campaign, and the disbanded enemy was re-organised into a native contingent in the company's service; with them Dr Hinton served.
Blog Archive
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2006
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October
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- Contemporaries
- The Royal College of Surgeons - Examinations
- James Hinton, my cousin
- Changing employment
- Attending medical lectures
- Early reading
- The Surgeons Apprentice - other skills
- The Surgeons Apprentice - Cholera
- The path to India and the British Raj
- An early start to life!
- Fathers Bank
- Some religion
- Going to school in Portsmouth
- Napoleon
- Winter
- Gone a roamin!
- An early reader
- A garden not far
- Boys will be boyz
- A narrow escape
- Early Years - Surgeon-Major Henry Benjamin Hinton
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October
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