The restored painting of Clement Stephenson
The restored painting of Clement Stephenson

The memory of a Tyneside pioneer in animal health and veterinary medicine has been revived in the place where today’s students begin their careers.

Clement Stephenson was one of the first local authority veterinary inspectors.

He worked in Newcastle and Northumberland, and helped build up the first “bank” of expertise in animal disease control.

At his death in 1918 he left £10,000 - a sizeable fortune in those days - to Durham University to establish a chair in comparartive pathology and bacteriology and to pay half the costs of setting up an agricultural research department in Newcastle.

That became Newcastle University School of Agriculture whose main lecture theatre is named after him.

To honour his pivotal role in veterinary science, a portrait of Stephenson was commissioned in 1916 from leading North East artist John Charlton.

He had been born in Bamburgh in Northumberland and had been commissioned to paint the royal processions at two Queen Victoria jubilees.

But as the years passed, the portrait was stored away and lay forgotten in a cupboard.

Now the university has had it restored by Northumberland expert Rory Johnson so it can be put on permanent display in the lecture theatre.

Several thousand vets are employed by the Government to carry out research, surveillance on animal disease and inspection.

They advise on policy and provide the veterinary evidence base for decision making on animal health and welfare.

But 150 years ago, there were no official Government veterinary advisers and no restrictions on who could call themselves vets.

Then cattle plague hit the country and new laws in 1866 brought in local authority veterinary inspectors, with Clement Stephenson one of this pioneers.

Clement Stephenson first undertook an apprenticeship with his father who was an unqualified veterinary surgeon and farrier working in Scotch Arms Yard, off Newcastle’s Bigg Market.

But the young Stephenson then went on to train at the Royal Veterinary College, where he qualified in 1856 and proceeded into practice.

He was one of the first local authority inspectors to be appointed in 1865.

But he also knew about cattle breeding and animal health and leased his own farm of 200 acres at Longbenton from Balliol College in Oxford, where he raised prize-winning Aberdeen Angus cattle.

He recognised the need to build up veterinary skills in the field, which led to new powers for local authorities in disease control and new approaches in tackling and controlling animal disease on farms.

Head of the School of Agriculture, Food and Rural Development Professor Rob Edwards said: “To most of our students today Clement Stephenson is, I am sure, entirely unfamiliar, except as the name of our main lecture theatre.

“This hasn’t been helped by the fact that his portrait has been a little neglected over the years and for some time languished in a cupboard.

“But we should not forget how he and his fellow veterinary inspectors in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries advanced our understanding of animal health. And he personally pushed forward developments for a centre of research and teaching at Newcastle.

“We have much to thank him for and I hope that having this beautifully painted and restored portrait on show once more will help him to be remembered.”