Arthur Webb-Jones


Arthur Webb-Jones was an eminent British gynaecologist who served extensively as a surgeon with the British Army in Egypt.

Birth and Family

Born in Glamorgan, Arthur was the second son of William Matthew Jones, co-owner of a trans-European shipping agents M. Jones and Brothers, and Agnes Ida Long.
His only sibling was Ernest William Jones the first class cricketer and father of choral conductor James William Webb-Jones.
His cousins included Edwin Price Jones, Vice-Consul for Chile and Secretary to the Chamber of Commerce, and Right Rev. William Wynne Jones, Anglican Bishop of Central Tanganyika in Africa.

Career

Arthur Webb-Jones was educated at Malvern College, St Thomas’s Hospital, and the University of London, where the subject of his MD thesis was "Bilharziosis in Women", a subject was able to write authoritatively as a consequence of his extensive experience in gynaecological surgery in Alexandria, Egypt. His notable published works include 'Lumbar Hernia' ) and 'Two Cases of Gynaecomastia'. He became a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England on 31 May 1900.
From 1900-1904, Webb-Jones served in the Egyptian Army in the Sudan, where he subsequently settled and established a private practice at Rue Stamboul, Alexandria, and was appointed Surgeon and Gynaecologist to the Government Hospital and Medical Officer to the Egyptian State Railway, Alexandria District. He received the thanks of the Sirdar and Governor-General of the Sudan for his services.
During the Gallipoli Campaign, Webb Jones performed yeoman service with the British Army from May 1915 to December 1916.
He resided in Egypt from 1913 to 1917. When, in spring 1917, an epidemic of typhus broke out in Alexandria, Webb-Jones was called upon to give an intravenous injection of saline solution to a brother practitioner, who was dying from typhus, and fatally infected himself in the process, as a consequence of which he died eleven days later, on 30 April 1917.
His death warranted a mention in a special intelligence report to the Houses of Parliament, which was published in The Lancet.
His name was placed in the Roll of Honour of the Royal College of Surgeons of England.

Marriage

Arthur Webb-Jones married Lillian Bell Long in 1906 and the couple had three children:
  1. Francis Arthur John Webb-Jones who changed his surname to Wakeman-Long at the time of his marriage. Francis was a barrister who served as Chairman of the family Steamship company, M. Jones and Brothers, until it was wound up in 1942.
  2. Marjorie Agnes Webb-Jones Married Lionel C. Lord Sept 1935 at Kensington.
  3. Arthur . Captain in the Royal Army Medical Corps. Married Doreen Ariadne Elwood.