(29 June 1829-19 Feb. 1907), physician. (Sir William Hingston, Senator Hingston) Born Hinchinbrook Township, Que. Parents: Lt. Col. Samuel James Hingston and his wife Eleanor McGrath. He studied medicine at McGill College (degree 1851) and in Edinburgh and continental European medical centres. A brilliantly successful career followed as a surgeon in Montreal. Dr Hingston was mayor of Montreal 1875 to 1877. As with his medical contemporary Sir James Grant, honour after honour came to him. He was knighted on 15 July 1895, and on 2 Jan. 1896 he was named to the Canadian Senate. On 16 Sept. 1875, he was married to a Glengarrian of the “Sandfield” and Fraserfield families, Margaret Josephine Macdonald (see Hingston, Margaret Josephine). Dr Hingston was the author of The Climate of Canada and Its Relation to Life and Health (Montreal, Dawson Brothers Publishers, 1884). In this volume, which includes some notices of GC, he mentions R.R. (Big Rory) McLennan as hammer thrower, and the tallness of the GC descendants of the people of Skye and Inverness, Scotland; and he observes that the strength and vigour of the GC Scots is evidence that the Scots have not degenerated in the New World. In 1897, he was one of the speakers scheduled to give addresses at Alexandria, 24 May, in celebration of Queen Victoria’s Jubilee. (Glengarry News 14 May 1897) Senator Hingston died in Montreal. Roman Catholic. A Protestant medical contemporary described his Roman Catholicism as “uncompromising but not aggressive.” (Macphail) Senator Hingston was one of the relatively few distinguished Canadians to have their lives in the Dictionary of National Biography. His entry there was by Stephen Leacock’s friend, Andrew–later Sir Andrew–Macphail. A revised entry based on the Macphail text appears in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, the recent successor to the Dictionary of National Biography.

Hingston’s life in DNB for 1901-1911 and in Dictionary of Canadian Biography Vol. XIII & ODict, also in Rose ii, 436-438, and Morgan (1898) 466-467; these sources provide information on his many honours * obituary (long, front page article) Glengarry News 22 Feb. 1907 (portrait) * souces as for his wife, this dictionary * question of “degeneration” of Canadians: see also Pringle, ix