====== Grant, Sir James Alexander ====== (8 Aug. 1831-5 Feb. 1920), physician. (year 1830 and date 11 Aug. for birth also found) (J. A. Grant, Sir James Grant) Born Inverness-shire, Scotland. Parents: Dr James Grant and his wife Jane Ord. He was brought to Canada by his parents in earliest childhood. He grew up at Martintown, and his early education was at Martintown and Williamstown (see Donald Ross Cameron). He also attended Queen’s University for a short time. His father having little income from his medical practice, young James had to finance his own education. He remembered borrowing five dollars from the Rev. John McKenzie, of Williamstown, to enable him to go to Kingston and compete (successfully, as it turned out) for a bursary. Grant received his medical degree from McGill in 1854. Even before he got his degree, he was practising medicine at Williamstown. He was probably the Dr James A. Grant Harkness notices as practising medicine at Williamstown in 1853 (see life of Dr James Grant), but there is a tradition that another Dr James A. Grant (known to the public more usually as Alexander Grant) was also on the scene at Williamstown. At any rate, the young doctor soon established himself at Ottawa, the scene of his long and successful medical career. He was physician to the governors general of Canada from 1867 till 1905. In this role his patients included Princess Louise, who was the daughter of Queen Victoria and the wife of Governor General Lorne. After 1905 Grant held the lesser title of honorary physician to the governors general of Canada. He was also the personal physician to Sir John A. Macdonald. In 1870 he accompanied the invalid Macdonald to Prince Edward Island. (//Dictionary of Canadian Biography//, XII, 601) Grant, a Conservative, was MP for Russell County from 1867 to 1874. It was probably in connection with his MP-ship as well as his GC connections that at a meeting of the provisional directors of the Coteau Landing and Ottawa Railway Company, held at Lancaster, //GC//, 2 May 1871, he was elected vice-president of the company. (//Witness// 3 May 1871) In 1872 he had the honour of presenting the Pacific Railway Bill to the House of Commons. In 1874, however, Grant was defeated as candidate for re-election in Russell. In the early 1880s, Dr Grant was being “spoken of for the vacancy in the Senate.” And about the beginning of 1882, the Cornwall //Freeholder// appears to have sought to promote Dr Grant as a rival to Alexandria’s Dr Donald McMillan for the Senate. Dr Grant did not get the senatorship. However, he became an MP again, this time for Ottawa from 1893 to 1896. Distinguished as a medical doctor, he was also a zealous geologist. He contributed many articles on medicine, geology and other subjects to journals. Also, he was a well-known public speaker. Grant received honour after honour, only a few of which need be named here. At home, he was president of the Canadian Medical Association and of the Royal Society of Canada. Abroad, he was an honorary member of the British Medical Association, and in 1887 received the Gold Cross of Italy. In 1887 he was knighted, being created a Knight Commander of the Most Distinguished Order of St. Michael and St. George. In 1896 he was the guest of the Queen at Balmoral Castle. There is some evidence of his interest in Grant family genealogy. He appears to have considered himself the chief or head of the Grants of Corrimony. (Rose, i, 104) He spoke at the unveiling of the Crysler’s Farm monument, 25 Sept. 1895. He was the author of unpublished reminiscences, written when he was 85. A distinguished public intellectual, and one of the great public figures of the golden years of Canadian nation-building, he has, amazingly, no life in the //Dictionary of Canadian Biography//. Like Sir William Osler, he brings to mind through the wealth of his interests the career of the elder Oliver Wendell Holmes. Sir James Grant died in Ottawa. He was married on 22 Jan. 1856 to Maria Malloch. (children: 12, 8 of whom lived to adult years). He was a Presbyterian. ---- W.E. Collins, “Sir James Alexander Grant,” //Bulletin canadien d’histoire de la médicine/ Canadian Bulletin of Medical History//, 2:1 (Summer 1985) 66-89, with portrait and discussion of the manuscript sources * lives of Grant in many biog. sources, including Rose, i, 103-104, //The Canadian Biographical Dictionary and Portrait Gallery…Ontario Volume// (1880) 20-22, //Appleton’s Cyclopaedia of American Biography// (1887-1924), Vol. II, 708, G. Mercer Adam, ed., //Prominent Men of Canada// (1892) 151-152, Canniff 398-400, Morgan (1898), Morgan (1912) , //MDict//, Johnson (1968), and Hurtig. These give the basic facts and, individually and collectively, are valuable documents illustrating Grant’s reputation * obituary, //Cornwall Freeholder// 12 Feb. 1920, //Glengarry News// 13 Feb. 1920 * Rhodes Grant, i, 64 * //Kitchener-Waterloo Record// 29 Oct. 1994, CP article (by Jim Bronskill): Ottawa restaurant, in Grant’s former home, alleged to be haunted * medical graduation, McGill, with “Thesis on Ovarian Dropsy,” //The Medical Chronicle or, Montreal Monthly Journal of Medicine & Surgery//, I(1854) 36-37 * returns from his European tour, “bringing with him a handsome silver cup from the Duke of Sutherland, for competition at the approaching Caledonian sports [presumably to be held in Ottawa]” (Ottawa news in //Witness// 6 Aug. 1875) *senatorship: //The Canadian Journal of Medical Science//, VI (Feb. 1881) 58; comments on //CF //in //Cornwall Reporter// 28 Jan. 1882 * letter from Martintown, //Cornwall Reporter// 16 July 1881, proudly claims Dr Grant as a Martintown boy *description by A.W. McDougald, //Glengarry News// 12 May 1933, in his hist. of GC, of Sir James Grant’s splendid speech to the Illinois St. Andrew’s Society in 1894 * Sir James Grant to deliver one of the Jubilee addresses on 24 May, Alexandria, //GN// 14 May 1897 * falls, fractures hip, //GN// 23 Jan. 1920 * tribute from Sir James Grant in obit. of Rev. Sister Angèle Gauthier, //Le Droit// 31 mars 1916 [<6>]