SWAYNE, JOSEPH GRIFFITHS (1819–1903), obstetric physician, born on 18 Oct. 1819 at Bristol, was second son of John Champeny Swayne, lecturer on midwifery in the Bristol medical school, whose father was for nearly sixty years vicar of Pucklechurch, Gloucestershire. His mother was eldest daughter of Dr. Thomas Griffiths, a medical practitioner in Bristol. After education at the now extinct proprietary Bristol college, where one of his teachers was Francis William Newman [q. v. Suppl. I], Swayne was apprenticed to his father and at the same time studied at the Bristol medical school and the royal infirmary. Later he went to Guy's Hospital and became M.R.C.S. and a licentiate of the Society of Apothecaries in 1841. He also studied in Paris, and in 1842 graduated M.B. of the University of London, obtaining the gold medal in obstetric medicine and being bracketed with Sir Alfred Baring Garrod [q. v. Suppl. II] for the gold medal in medicine. In 1845 he proceeded M.D. at London and joined his father as lecturer on midwifery in the Bristol medical school; he was sole lecturer from 1850 until 1895, when he was appointed emeritus professor. In 1853 he was elected physician accoucheur to the Bristol general hospital, one of the first appointments of the kind out of London; he held this post until 1875, when he became consulting obstetric physician. Greatly esteemed as a consultant, he had a large practice in the west of England. He attached an importance in advance of his time to asepsis, and deprecated long hair or beards for those who practise surgery or midwifery. As early as 1843 he investigated cholera, and described a micro-organism which some have suggested was the comma bacillus which Koch proved to be the cause of the disease in 1884. Swayne died suddenly on 1 Aug. 1903, and was buried at Arno's Vale cemetery, Bristol. He married Georgina (d. 1865), daughter of the Rev. G. Gunning, and had issue one son and one daughter.
Swayne possessed much artistic and literary ability. He published, in addition to many papers in medical journals, 'Obstetric Aphorisms for the Use of Students' (1856; 10th edit. 1893), which was translated into eight languages, including Japanese and Hindustani.
[Bristol Med. Chir. Journal, 1903, xxi. 193-202 (with photograph and bibliography); Brit. Med. Journal, 1903, ii. 338.]
SWAYTHLING, first Baron. [See Montagu, Sir Samuel (1832-1911).]
SWINBURNE, ALGERNON CHARLES (1837–1909), poet, born in Chester Street, Grosvenor Place, London, on 5 April 1837, was eldest child of Admiral Charles Henry Swinburne (1797-1877), by his wife Lady Jane Henrietta (1809-1896), daughter of George Ashburnham, third earl of Ashburnham. His father was second son of Sir John Edward Swinburne (1762–1860), sixth baronet of Capheaton, in Northumberland. This baronet, who exercised a strong influence over his grandson, the poet, had been born and brought up in France, and cultivated the memory of Mirabeau. In habits, dress, and modes of thought he was like a French nobleman ,of the ancien regime. From his father, a cut and dried unimaginative old 'salt,' the poet inherited little but a certain identity of colour and expression; his features and something of his mental character were his mothers. Lady Jane was a woman of exquisite accomplishment, and widely read in foreign literature. From his earliest years Algernon was trained, by his grandfather and by his mother, in the French and Italian languages. He was brought up, with the exception of long visits to Northumberland, in the Isle of Wight, his grandparents residing at The Orchard, Niton, Ventnor, and his parents at East Dene, Bonchurch.
He had been born all but dead and was not expected to live an hour; but though he was always nervous and slight, his childhood, spent mainly in the open air, was active and healthy. His parents were high-church and he was brought up as 'a quasi-catholic' He recollected in after years the enthusiasm with which he welcomed the process of confirmation, and his 'ecstasies of adoration when receiving the Sacrament.' He early developed a love for climbing, riding, and swimming, and never cared, through life, for any other sports. His father, the admiral, taught him to plunge in the sea when he was still almost an infant, and he was always a fearless and, in relation to his physique, a powerful swimmer. 'He could swim and walk for ever' (Lord Redesdale). He was prepared for Eton by Collingwood Forster Fenwick, rector of Brook, near Newport, Isle of Wight, who expressed his surprise at finding the child so deeply
