Haemoglobin J Baltimore in a Kent Family

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Abstract
There have now been several reports of abnormal hemoglobins in English families. Hemoglobin Norfolk was the first to be discovered, but it was not seen again in a survey of 1000 unrelated inhabitants of the Norfolk county though 2 further examples of other abnormal hemoglobins were discovered. Thus abnormal hemoglobins must be expected to be seen from time to time in Great Britain. The identification of hemoglobin J Baltimore had been made in American negroes, and the finding of a J [beta] is not entirely unusual in persons of negroid stock, but there has been one hemoglobin of that mobility seen in an Irishman, and, like J Baltimore, this hemoglobin J also was an abnormal [beta]-chain variant. A hemoglobin J [beta] has also been found in a Bengali family, but other examples of hemoglobin J in South-East Asia so far examined have been found abnormal in the [alpha]-chain. At presnet it is useless to speculate whether sporadic findings of an identical abnormal hemoglobin indicate a relationship between different populations. These may well arise from independent mutations, and the somewhat more frequent finding of hemoglobin J J Baltimore, or a hemoglobin J[beta], which may or may not be the same, in persons with African ancestry could be due to a more intensive examination of their blood by electrophoresis.