The statue stands on a white granite plinth about 3 metres (10 feet) high. The bronze statue, about 125% lifesize, stands atop the plinth. The statue shows Harvey dressed in the robes of the early 17th century. He is looking south, across the English Channel, and his right hand is held across his heart. In his left hand he is holding a heart (see photo).
There are several inscriptions on the memorial. Carved into the front of the memorial is his name "Harvey". Towards the base of the plinth is a plaque that reads:
"This plaque was presented to / the Mayor and Corporation of Folkestone / by Sir Thomas Holmes Sellors D.M. F.R.C.S., President / on behalf of / the British Medical Association / during the 141st annual representative meeting / 8th June 1973 / in honour of William Harvey / and in the presence of / the Harveian Society of London".
On the rear of the plinth is inscribed:
"William Harvey / Discoverer of the circulation / of the blood / Born in Folkestone April 1 1578 / Died in London June 3 1657 / Buried at Hempstead Essex".
On the base of the statue is engraved:
"Albert Bruce Joy Sc. / London, 1881".
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Harvey was an English physician who was the first to describe accurately how blood was pumped around the body by the heart.
William Harvey was born in Folkestone, Kent on 1 April 1578. His father was a merchant. Harvey was educated at King's College, Canterbury and then at Cambridge University. He then studied medicine at the University of Padua in Italy, where the scientist and surgeon Hieronymus Fabricius tutored him.
Fabricius, who was fascinated by anatomy, recognised that the veins in the human body had one-way valves, but was puzzled as to their function. It was Harvey who took the foundation of Fabricius's teaching, and went on to solve the riddle of what part the valves played in the circulation of blood through the body.
On his return from Italy in 1602, Harvey established himself as a physician. His career was helped by his marriage to Elizabeth Browne, daughter of Elizabeth I's physician, in 1604. In 1607, he became a fellow of the Royal College of Physicians and, in 1609, was appointed physician to St Bartholomew's Hospital. In 1618, he became physician to Elizabeth's successor James I and to James' son Charles when he became king. Both James and Charles took a close interest in and encouraged Harvey's research.
Harvey's research was furthered through the dissection of animals. He first revealed his findings at the College of Physicians in 1616, and in 1628 he published his theories in a book entitled 'Exercitatio Anatomica de Motu Cordis et Sanguinis in Animalibus' ('An Anatomical Study of the Motion of the Heart and of the Blood in Animals'), where he explained how the heart propelled the blood in a circular course through the body. His discovery was received with great interest in England, although it was greeted with some scepticism on the Continent.
Harvey was also the first to suggest that humans and other mammals reproduced via the fertilisation of an egg by sperm. It took a further two centuries before a mammalian egg was finally observed, but nonetheless Harvey's theory won credibility during his lifetime.
Harvey retained a close relationship with the royal family through the English Civil War and witnessed the Battle of Edgehill. Thanks to Charles I he was, for a short time, warden of Merton College, Oxford (1645 - 1646). He died on 3 June 1657.
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