biographies

Rowan, Thomas (1852 - 1935)

M.D. (Syd), F.R.C.S. (Edin.)

Born
1852
Newry, County Down, Ireland
Died
1935
South Yarra, Victoria, Australia
Occupation
Medical practitioner, Gynaecologist and Obstetrician

Details

Transcription of item written by Dr Colin Macdonald and published in "The Book of Remembrance", The Royal Women's Hospital, Melbourne, 1956.


DR. THOMAS ROWAN
(1876 - 1895)

Thomas Rowan, a Protestant Ulsterman, was born in 1852 in County Down, near the clean and well built town of Newry, named from a yew planted by St. Patrick himself; Newry far from merits Swift’s ill-natured couplet "High church, low steeple, dirty streets and proud people". During Rowan’s long eventful life, few obstetricians can have traversed such a wide gamut of medical experience.

Before the age of 21 he had qualified in medicine at Edinburgh where he had been one of Lister’s dressers at the Royal Infirmary. Threatened with T.B. - to use a long discarded clinical phrase - he was successfully urged by his brother Andrew - of St. Hubert’s vineyard, Yering, near Lilydale - to come out to the warmer Antipodean climate of Melbourne. So he became a resident at the Bendigo Hospital and later at the Women’s Hospital; this latter appointment introduced him as an assistant to Dr. Tracy who had the largest obstetrical practice in the Colony. When Tracy left for England - soon to return to die in Melbourne in 1874 - Rowan was left in charge of this very extensive connection, a heavy responsibility for a young and comparatively inexperienced man of only 22. A dark handsome Irishman, his youth early masked by a thick black beard, he was appointed to the Women’s Hospital in 1876 and for 19 years carried on an effective and fashionable practice in Melbourne. At first he lived in Collins Street East, but later moved to a large house at the corner of Exhibition and Flinders Street, where "The Herald" office not stands. Because it was on the route from the Flinders Street station to the Scotch College in Eastern Hill, the writer of this memoir well remembers this residence, with its long high brick wall capped by broken glass, enclosing a large allotment and garden.

In 1879 Dr. Rowan married Eleanor Austin - the eldest daughter of Mr. Joseph Austin of Green Vale, Willaura, belonging to the Austin dynasty of Victorian pastoralists. There were three daughters and two sons, one of whom was killed in the 1914-18 War. A grandson, Kingsley Rowan, married the daughter of Dr. G.A.D. McArthur, whose family are also numbered amongst the landed gentry of the Western District, and whose half brother, Dr. Norman McArthur was a member of the Honorary Staff of the Women’s Hospital.

In 1895, when Rowan with all his family returned to Britain, his connection with the Women’s Hospital ceased. He remained in England until after the Boer War when Johannesburg in South Africa seemed a good locale for medical practice. But the bustling Transvaal city quickly lost any attraction, and Rowan returned to Australia to Ballarat, where he built a large hospital with an adjoining private hospital at the corner of Lyons and Dana Streets. During this period gold was struck at Mafeking - 14 miles west of Ararat - near Mt. William in the Grampians Mountains, and the adventurous and restless Irishman set out with tent and wheelbarrow for the new goldfield; disappointment at not striking it rich was intensified by a neighbour who practiced on the cornet for the greater part of the day and night and Rowan returned to Ballarat after only a few weeks experience as a digger.

During the first World War, Rowan, though a man of well over 60, managed to enlist in the A.I.F. and became a Medical Officer on the troopship "Berrima", spending several hours in the icy midwinter water of the English Channel when this transport was torpedoed off Weymouth in 1916.

At one time he stood unsuccessfully as a Unionist - anti Home Rule - candidate for the House of Commons, and an Ulster constituency. After the War, returning once more to Australia, Rowan settled at Olinda in the Dandenong Hills, but his hopes of a well earned retirement could not be realized, for with no doctors within several miles, he was often forced to answer urgent medical calls.

This notable personality, who had the reputation of being very courteous, though somewhat distant in his manner, to student and resident, died in 1935 at the advanced age of 83 in Sister Macdonald’s Hospital "Osmington", Domain Road, South Yarra. Not many men who had been connected with the Women’s Hospital spanned a wider medical life.

Archival/Heritage Resources

Royal Women's Hospital Archives

  • Book of Remembrance, 1956 - 1975; Royal Women's Hospital Archives [ Details... ].

Prepared by: Robyn Waymouth

Created: 31 July 2006, Last modified: 26 November 2006