Clifford Beale was born in Birmingham, the son of William John Beale, solicitor. From Edgbaston Proprietary School, he went on to Harrow and thence to Caius College, Cambridge, where he graduated as B.A. in 1874. He qualified at Guy’s Hospital four years later and completed his studies with visits to Vienna and other Continental clinics. He held junior appointments at Guy’s and in 1881 was elected assistant physician to the Great Northern Central Hospital. He received the same appointment at the City of London Hospital for Diseases of the Chest in 1887. He was ultimately consulting physician to both Hospitals for some forty-five years, and he played a major part in the development of the former— now the Royal Northern Hospital. He was an early advocate of the open-air treatment of tuberculosis and in 1895, with V. D. Harris, published a text-book on The Treatment of Pulmonary Consumption. He was also a pioneer in the cause of hospital contributory schemes.

When he died at the age of 101, Beale was not only Senior Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians, but the oldest member of the British Medical Association. His hundredth birthday had been widely acclaimed. A widower, he had survived his two children. He was the brother of Peyton Beale, consulting surgeon to King’s College Hospital.

G H Brown

[B.M.J., 1951, 1953; Times, 2 Feb. 1953; Al.Cantab., i, 200; Biog. Details left by Dr. Beale, in R.C.P. Library]