Alexander Russell Simpson was born in Bathgate and educated at Bathgate Academy. He obtained his MD from the University of Edinburgh and undertook postgraduate study in Berlin, Halle, Wurzburg and Montpellier. During this period he acquired several languages which enabled him to maintain close contact with continental medicine. He specialised in obstetrics and became closely associated with his uncle, James Young Simpson.

Alexander Crum Brown was born in Edinburgh in 1838. He initially entered the University of Edinburgh to study arts before transferring to medicine. He was awarded an MA in 1858 and an MD in 1861. Brown undertook further study at the University of London in the sciences and then studied chemistry in Germany. He subsequently returned to Edinburgh, where he taught medicine and chemistry as a private lecturer. He died in Edinburgh in 1922.

Andrew Smart obtained his MD from Edinburgh in 1862, having trained in Edinburgh, London, Berlin, Prague, Vienna and Paris. He also obtained the Licentiate in Midwifery diploma from the Rotunda Hospital, Dublin, in 1863. In Edinburgh, he worked as Resident Clinical Physician at the Royal Infirmary and as Assistant Professor of Practical Medicine at the University of Edinburgh. His interest in rinderpest, also known as cattle plague, led to his appointment as commissioner of an inquiry into the disease, resulting in his 'Reports to the Lord Provost and Magistrates of Edinburgh on the pathological appearances, symptoms, treatment, and means of preventing the cattle plague', published in 1866. Smart died in Edinburgh in 1911.

Claud Muirhead was born in Edinburgh in 1836, the namesake of his father, Claud Muirhead, owner of the Edinburgh Advertiser. He briefly studied divinity at Edinburgh before choosing a medical career and trained in Edinburgh, Berlin, Vienna and Paris. He obtained his MD from Edinburgh in 1862, alongside his brother William. Muirhead held several posts at the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh, beginning in 1865 as Resident Assistant Physician and becoming Senior Physician in 1882 before retiring in 1891. He served on the board of managers of the Infirmary from 1893 to 1902, the first five years as a representative of the College. As Chief Medical Officer of the Scottish Widows Fund, he published 'The causes of death among the assured, 1874 to 1894'. He died in Edinburgh on 22 June 1910.

James Rutherford was born in 1840, the son of a Presbyterian minister. He obtained his MD from Edinburgh in 1863 and moved to Vienna after graduation to practise privately. After briefly working as Assistant Medical Officer at Birmingham Borough Asylum, he held a series of posts in Scottish asylums, first as Medical Superintendent of the Argyll and Bute District Asylum at Lochgilphead in 1870 and then as Medical Superintendent of the Barony Parochial Asylum at Lenzie in 1874. In 1883 he was appointed the third Physician Superintendent of the Crichton Royal Institution, Dumfries, where he oversaw the modernisation and expansion of the hospital. In 1867, with Lockhart Robertson, he published an English translation of Wilhelm Griesinger's 'Manual of mental diseases'. He retired in 1908 owing to ill health and died at Mountainhall, Dumfries, on 8 March 1910.

Robert Craig Maclagan was born in Edinburgh on 6 March 1839, the son of Sir Andrew Douglas Maclagan, a physician and authority on forensic medicine and public health. He studied at Edinburgh and obtained his MD in 1860. His medical publications include 'On the arsenic eaters of Styria', published in the Edinburgh Medical Journal in 1864. Maclagan was a co-founder of the Scottish Association for the Medical Education of Women and an early Vice-President of the Edinburgh College of Medicine for Women. Outside medicine, he was responsible for the Maclagan manuscripts, a collection concerning folklore and belief in the West Highlands gathered between 1893 and 1902 under his direction. He died at his home in Coates Crescent, Edinburgh, on 12 July 1919.

Andrew Davidson was born in Kinneff, Aberdeenshire, on 22 August 1836. He studied medicine at Edinburgh, graduating in 1862. He and his wife Christina joined a mission to Madagascar in the same year, where Davidson opened a practice in Antananarivo. In 1863 he was appointed Court Physician to Radama II, and in 1865 he received permission to establish a mission hospital. Following a dispute with the Malagasy Prime Minister, Davidson and his wife moved to Mauritius, where he held several medical posts and published reports on malaria and public health. After returning to Britain in the early 1890s, he published 'Geographical pathology' in 1892 and 'Hygiene and diseases of warm climates' in 1893. Davidson was an early advocate of tropical medicine and in 1900 became the University of Edinburgh's first lecturer in the subject. He died in Ilkley, Yorkshire, on 13 January 1918.

William Ross was born in 1807 and obtained his MD from Glasgow in 1830. He practised medicine in Dingwall and was a prominent local figure, serving as Lord Provost from 1846 to 1851. Following his death in 1869, the Ross Memorial Hospital in Dingwall was erected in his memory and opened in 1872.

John George Sinclair Coghill was born in Caithness in 1834 and obtained his MD from Edinburgh in 1857, his studies having been briefly interrupted by naval service during the Crimean War. After graduating, he worked as a demonstrator of anatomy at the University of Glasgow from 1858 to 1861 before moving to Shanghai, where he served as municipal medical officer and consulting physician. He returned to Edinburgh in 1869 to work under Sir James Simpson but left in 1875 to become Physician to the National Hospital for Consumption, Ventnor, on the Isle of Wight. His publications include 'New operation for vesico vaginal fistula' and 'Pathology and treatment of irritable uterus', both published in 1859. He died at Ventnor on 5 June 1899.

William Helps trained at St Bartholomew's Hospital, London, and obtained his MD from St Andrews in 1854. He became a Fellow of the College in 1858. In 1852 he was appointed apothecary at Bethlem Royal Hospital and in 1862 succeeded William Charles Hood as Resident Physician and Superintendent. He died in office in 1865.