James Young Simpson became professor of midwifery at Edinburgh University in 1840, physician to Queen Victoria in 1847, president of the Royal College of Physicians in 1850 and was appointed baronet in 1866. His contributions to obstetrics are overshadowed by his discovery of the anaesthetic effects of chloroform in November 1847. After ether was discovered in 1846, Simpson was quick to use it to relieve the pains of labour.