SIR JOHN FORBES, (1787-1861), M.D., was born at Cuttlebrae, Banffshire. He attended the Grammar School at Aberdeen, and afterwards entered Marischal College. Having for nine years been assistant-surgeon and surgeon in the navy, he in 1817 graduated at Edinburgh, and then commenced practice in Penzance, whence he removed to Chichester. He took up his residence in London in 1840, and was the same year appointed physician to the Prince Consort, and in 1841 physician to the Queen's household. He was a fellow of the Royal Society, and D.C.L. of Oxford; and in 1853 he received the honour of knighthood. He died November 13, 1861, at Whitchurch in Berkshire.

Sir John Forbes was better known as an author and editor than as a practical physician. His works include the following:— Original Gases . . . illustrating the Use of the Stethescope and Percussion in the Diagnosis of Diseases of the Chest, 1824 ; Illustrations of Modem Mesmerism, 1845 ; A Physician's Holiday, 1st ed. 1849 ; Memorandums made in Ireland in the Autumn of 1852, 2 vols., 1853 ; Sight-seeing in Germany and the Tyrol in the Autumn of 1855, 1856. He was joint editor with Drs Tweedie and Conolly of The Cyclopaedia of Practical Medicine, 4 vols., 1833-35 ; and in 1836 he founded the British and Foreign Medical Review, which, after a period of prosperity, involved its editor in pecuniary loss, and ceased to exist, in consequence of the advocacy in its later numbers of doctrines obnoxious to the profession.