Catholics in Irish Medicine. Part II: Breaking down the barriers

Following on from last week's post which traced the exclusion of Catholics from access to medical training and appointments in the seventeenth and eighteenth century, this post will look at the nineteenth century and the individuals and Acts of Parliament which broke down these barriers.

The Catholic Relief Acts of 1791 and 1793 removed many of the political, educational and economic disabilities which had restricted Catholics during the eighteenth century. The 1793 Act also opened Trinity College up to Catholic students. For medics this was followed in 1800 by the School of Physic Act, which allowed Catholics to become Fellows and Officers of the College of Physicians, if they took an oath of allegiance to the King. Interestingly the oaths against popery and transubstantiation were still required of Protestant medics, and were not finally phased out until the 1840s.

The election of the College of Physicians' first Catholic President, Sir Dominic Corrigan, in 1859 represented the advancement of the Catholic middle classes in Ireland at the time. Born in Dublin in 1802, the son of a dealer in agricultural tools, Corrigan was educated at the Lay College at Maynooth, taking his medical degree from Edinburgh in 1825. Corrigan returned to Dublin, establishing a practice on Ormond Quay, and by 1837 he had moved to Merrion Square, the centre of the elite medical profession in Ireland. In 1847 Corrigan was appointed Physician-in-Ordinary to Her Majesty in Ireland; the first Catholic to hold the post, the appointment was in recognition of Corrigan's work, especially during the Irish Famine.

Corrigan was a loud proponent of non-denominational education in Ireland. In 1870 he was elected Liberal MP for Dublin, and was actively involved in campaigning for reform of the education system. He corresponded with Prime Minister William Gladstone on the university question in Ireland, and many of Corrigan's views would shape Gladstone ill-fated University Education (Ireland) Bill. Corrigan's support of non-denominational education brought him into conflict with the Catholic hierarchy, who felt he was betraying his religion. Corrigan did not stand for re-election in 1874, and as a draft letter in the archive makes clear, if he had, many within the Catholic Church would have actively opposed his candidature.

In 1867 the last religious exclusion relating to the College of Physicians was removed. In 1713 Sir Patrick Dun had bequeathed money to the College to establish a King's Professorship of Physic. An Act of 1741 had extended this to three professorships, and included the stipulations 'that all Papists and persons professing the Popish religion … shall be utterly incapable of being elected into any of the Professorships', something not stipulated by Dun's Will.

This exclusion remained in force until 1867 when Haughton's Act was passed. Rev. Dr. Samuel Haughton studied at Trinity, was ordained in 1847 and gained his MB in 1862. He did much to reform the practices at Sir Patrick Dun's Hospital where he worked, and where the King's Professors taught. The act which bore his name stipulated that the King's Professorships were 'open to persons of all Nations, and … shall not be subject to any Disability on account of Religion'.