Today we remember Ian Macdonald Brown (1889 - 1916) who died 100 years ago today.
Ian Macdonald Brown came up to Downing in 1907 (pictured on the left in the Freshmen group above) and was an active member of College, playing rugby, rowing and also joining the Debating and Music Societies. He appears in the Rowing Trials photograph in Michaelmas 1907 and is recorded as a Cox in the Scratch Fours winning crew (“Victorious Four”) in the same Term. In his performances for the Music Society he was noted to have a ‘great voice’ and received ‘enthusiastic encores’.
Macdonald Brown took his B.A. (Natural Sciences) in 1910 and M.A. in 1914. After continuing his medical studies at the University of Edinburgh, he entered the London Hospital in 1911.
One of the first of many who volunteered once war was declared, Macdonald Brown was given a commission in the Royal Army Medical Corps and sent to Gallipoli in June 1915, although he was invalided later in August 1915. On return to the Front, he acted as a surgeon, first to the New Zealand Division and subsequently to the 190th Brigade, Royal Field Artillery, achieving the rank of 2nd Lieutenant and Captain. He was killed whilst attending the sick and wounded under fire near Ypres, Flanders, on 15th November 1916, age 28, leaving a wife, Dora (née Humphries), and an infant son.
For more information, see the full entry for Ian Macdonald Brown in our Roll of Honour.
Published 15 November 2016.