Ceylon Medical College

The Bengal Medical College was established in Calcutta in 1835. In 1839 Stewart-Mackenzie, the British Governor of Ceylon, started sending a small number of Ceylonese to study medicine in Calcutta.[3] In 1847 Samuel Fisk Green, an American medical missionary, started a private medical school in Manipay, northern Ceylon.[4] The establishment of a medical school in Ceylon was advocated by Governor George William Anderson in 1852.[5]

The island was hit by the yaws disease in the 1860s, leading to a massive depopulation in the Vanni.[3][6] In 1867 governor Hercules Robinson appointed James Loos, the colonial surgeon for the Northern Province, to investigate the depopulation.[3][6] Amongst Loos' recommendations was that there should be a plan for medical education in the country.[3][6] The Colombo Medical School was opened on 1 June 1870 by Governor Robinson.[5][7] The school was based in the female surgical ward of the then General Hospital in Colombo.[6] The school was controlled by the government's Principal Civil Medical Officer.[7] The school's courses lasted five years after which students sat examinations and if they passed they received a diploma of Licentiate of Medicine and Surgery (LMS).[5][7] This allowed them to practice medicine and surgery.[5] The school had lecture rooms, laboratories, dissecting rooms and two libraries.[5] Physics and chemistry was taught at Ceylon Technical College.[5] The first batch consisted of 25 students (all male).[7][8] James Loos was the school's first principal.[9][10]

The school benefited from large endowments, including land and buildings, provided by locals.[9][11] In 1875 Mudaliyar Samson Rajapakse gifted three and a half acres of land on which the school's successor, the Faculty of Medicine, University of Colombo, stands today.[6] The De Soysa Hospital/Lying-in-Home and the biology building was given to the school by Sir Charles Henry de Soysa.[6] In the same year his uncle Mudaliyar Susew de Soysa donated the school buildings which housed the colonial medical library, the pathology museum and the biological laboratory.[6] His son Mudaliyar J. W. C. de Soysa provided the funds to build the bacteriological institute in 1899.[6] Other benefactors included Muhandiram A. Simon Fernando Wijegooneratne and Vimala Gunawardane.[6]

The school's course length was extended to four years in 1873.[8] Loos left the school in 1875 after being appointed colonial surgeon for the Central Province.[6] He was replaced by Edwin Lawson Koch.[6] In 1876 the government started providing scholarships which provided free education at the school and post-graduate studies in Britain.[12] Koch died in 1877 and was replaced by Julian Louis Vanderstraatcn.[6] The school was renamed Ceylon Medical College in 1880.[13] The college's course length was extended to five years in 1884.[8]

On 29 December 1887 the school's LMS diploma was recognised by the General Medical Council at a meeting of the Privy Council held at Osborne House.[5][7][12][14] This recognition meant that holders of the Colombo LMS were registered medical practitioners under the Medical Act 1886 and could practice anywhere in the British Empire.[5][12] They could also pursue post-graduate studies in Britain without needing to re-take any undergraduate courses.[12]

The college started admitting female students in 1892.[6][14] Allan Perry took over from Vanderstraatcn in 1898.[6] In 1905 two ordinances were passed relating to the college. The Council of the Ceylon Medical College was incorporated by Ordinance No. 3 1905.[5][12] Ordinance No. 5 1905 (Medical Registration Ordinance) allowed the Council of the Ceylon Medical College to register individuals (including holders of the Colombo LMS) allowed to practice medicine and surgery in Ceylon.[7][12]

The Ceylon University Ordinance No. 20 of 1942 established the University of Ceylon on 1 July 1942 by amalgamating Ceylon Medical College with Ceylon University College.[15][16][17] The medical college became the new university's faculty of medicine.[8]