USA > Louisiana > Orleans Parish > New Orleans > Standard history of New Orleans, Louisiana, giving a description of the natural advantages, natural history settlement, Indians, Creoles, municipal and military history, mercantile and commercial interests, banking, transportation, etc. > Part 22
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Dr. Edward Barton, a Virginian by birth, settled in New Orleans in the first or second decade of the century. He made a careful study of yellow fever and wrote much on the subject, advocating the theory that, under favorable meteorolog- ical and terrene conditions (notably, the digging and upturning of the soil in summer), the dreaded disease might originate in the city. This was violently op- posed by the believers in the invariable importation of yellow fever, and the perfect efficacy of quarantine as a preventive. Dr. Barton filled the chair of Materia Med- ica and Therapeutics in the University of Louisiana from 1835 to 1840. He dicd in 1867.
Dr. William Newton Mercer was a very prominent figure in the New Orleans of ante-bellum days. He was a native of Cecil county, Maryland, born in 1792. He had every educational advantage during his youth, and was, for several years, a pupil of Dr. Benjamin Rush, in the University of Pennsylvania. After graduating with honors, Dr. Mercer was appointed assistant surgeon in the army, about the beginning of the war of 1812. He came to New Orleans with the army in 1816, but was soon ordered to Natchez, where he resided for some years, winning a high po- sition in the community by his sterling character and his lofty integrity. Dr. Mer- cer returned to New Orleans in 1843, and soon became one of its most honored citizens. He erected a handsome dwelling on Canal street, where he dispensed a courtly hospitality. His deeds of kindness and charity have left an enduring record in this city. St. Anna's Asylum, one of our most worthy charities, was liberally endowed by him in memory of the lovely daughter, who died in her twentieth year of consumption. In conjunction with Dr. Duncan, of Natchez, Dr. Mercer paid an installment due on the home of Henry Clay, who would have been involved in bank- ruptcy but for the timely aid so generously tendered to him. Dr. Mercer was, in sentiment, loyal to the Union, but he shared all the hardships of his fellow citizens
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during the war, and was enabled to assist and protect many unfortunate families, through the respect and confidence he inspired, even in the Federal authorities. He refused to take the oath of allegiance, but gave into the hands of the provost marshal a list of all his property, retaining $2,000 in gold for his support. This sum he reported to General Butler, who left him in undisturbed possession of it. Dr. Mercer lived in New Orleans for some years after the war, the type of a generation of courteous and noble gentlemen.
Dr. Alfred Mercier shed upon the city of his birth not only the lustre of pro- fessional ability, but also the soft radiance of literary talents of a high order. Born in 1816, he lived through the stirring events of the century and died in 1894. Dr. Mereier was a graduate of the College of Louis le Grand, having received his med- ical education in France. He was the secretary of the Athénée Louisianaise, and a leading spirit in literary circles, being a distinguished Latin, Greek and Italian ' scholar. "The Rose of Smyrna," "The Hermit of Niagara," "St. Ybars Planta- tion" and "Lidia" are among the most charming productions of his pen.
Dr. C. A. Luzenberg was born of Austrian parents in the city of Verona, Italy, in 1805. His father removed to Germany, where the talented youth received his education, and acquitted himself so brilliantly that the Mayor of Wissenburg is said to have removed his hat in the presence of the elder Luzenberg, saying: "Sir, I must uncover my head before the man who owns such a son !" Dr. Luzenberg emigrated to Philadelphia in 1819. Becoming deeply interested in tropical fevers, he decided to settle in New Orleans, where the field for study would be varied and extensive. He accordingly located in the southern metropolis in 1829 and was shortly after eleeted house surgeon of the Charity Hospital. Dr. Luzenberg devoted his tal- ent and energy to combating yellow fever, the scourge which then visited the eity almost every year. He revolutionized the medical practice of the day. Instead of using calomel and purgatives, he treated the disease by general and local bleeding. This method was met by violent opposition and fierce invective was resorted to in the medical journals of the dav to combat this heresy. Dr. Luzenberg was the first practitioner in New Orleans who excluded light from the apartments of small- pox patients, having noticed its baleful influence in the disfiguring effect of the malady. In 1832 the Doetor contraeted a wealthy marriage with Mrs. Mary Ford and enjoyed an extensive European tour, visiting all the hospitals, studying, eom- paring, analyzing with inexhaustible energy. His return to New Orleans was greeted with enthusiasm. The charitable impulses of his nature led him to devote two hours daily to the service of the poor and to offer, during an epidemie, to treat
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all indigent Germans gratis. With the wealth now at his disposal he built a private hospital on Elysian Fields called the Franklin Infirmary. The operations performed by Dr. Luzenberg entitled him to rank among the foremost surgcons of the century. In removing a cancer he made a complete extirpation of the parotid gland; the patient, a man of sixty-two, survived and lived, in good health, for several years. He also made an excision of six inches of the ileum, and distinguished himself by tying the primitive iliac artery for the cure of an aneurism of the external iliac. Dr. Luzenberg's specialty was the removal of cataract, and many grateful eyes owed the blessing of sight to his skill. This wise physician was Dean of the Medical College of Louisiana, which he originated, delivering lectures in the old State House on Canal street and giving demonstrations in the Charity Hospital. Dr. Luzenberg also filled the chairs of Anatomy and Surgery in 1835. This man of strong charac- ter, fearless and outspoken, was persecuted and maligned by many enemies, and his life was embittered and saddened by their machinations. He withdrew voluntar- ily from the college, but was expelled from the Physico-Medical Society, and sued for mal praxis in the Criminal Court. The suit was carried to the Supreme Court of Louisiana, where Dr. Luzenberg was triumphantly acquitted. He endured these trials with dignity and courage, turning a deaf ear to those who counselled flight, or withdrawal from the scene of so many labors. He remained, endured and con- quered. He now devoted himself entirely to the Charity Hospital, and in spite of opposition was elected an administrator, and afterwards vice-president, a position which he held for the rest of his life. The research and experience of years were to have been embodied in a work on yellow fever, but although he collected much data, it was never arranged and completed. In 1839 Dr. Luzenberg founded the "Society of Natural History and Sciences," and in 1843 he formed and incorporated the "Louisiana Medico-Chirurgical Society." In 1843 he was appointed physician to the Marine Hospital. As there was no government hospital, he appropriated his own, and filled the house with comforts and the garden with curious specimens of vegetable and animal life to amuse the invalid sailors. They were removed from his care for political reasons, and he then received into his hospital the invalided soldiers of the Mexican war. Dr. Luzenberg's health failed in 1848, and he left the city to find strength at some Virginia springs, but died en route in Cincinnati, July 15, 1848.
Dr. Erasmus Darwin Fenner inherited his love of medicine from his father, a distinguished physician of a fine North Carolina family. He graduated at the University of Transylvania, Ky., and commenced to practice in Jackson, Tenn. He
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married in 1832, but lost his young wife in 1837, and cherished her memory with unswerving fidelity throughout his long and useful life. In 1840 he removed to New Orleans with his little son, to whose cducation he devoted all his leisure hours. Then ensued some years of poverty and obscurity, through which the Doctor strug- gled sturdily towards the prominence and success which he finally achieved. In 1844 he published, in collaboration with Dr. A. Hester, the New Orleans Medical Journal. So low were the funds of the two editors that the Journal was published on credit, but each number managed to pay its way, until it was absorbed in the New Orleans Medical and Surgical Journal (1848), a publication to which Dr. Fenner contributed largely and brilliantly. Three of his most valued articles were two accounts of the yellow fever prevailing in 1846 and 1848, and a pamphlet enti- tled, "History of the Epidemic of Yellow Fever in New Orleans in 1853." Dr. Fenner was an ardent advocate of sanitary measures, but his advice was indifferently received. The earnest object of his life was attained when he established, with the aid of some kindred spirits, the New Orleans School of Medicine, in 1856. The faculty of the new school was as follows :
Dr. E. D. Fenner, Dean of the Faculty and Professor of Principles and Prac- tice of Medicine.
Dr. J. M. W. Picton, Professor Diseases of Women and Children.
Dr. Thos. Peniston, Professor Chemical Medicine.
Dr. Samuel Choppin, Professor of Surgery.
Dr. C. Beard, Professor of Anatomy.
Dr. Howard Smith, Professor of Materia Medica.
Dr. I. L. Crawcour, Professor of Medical Chemistry.
Dr. A. F. Axson, Professor of Physiology.
Dr. Warren Brickell, Professor of Obstetrics.
Dr. Anthony Peniston, Adjunct Professor of Anatomy.
Dr. Fenner's eloquence and energy secured to the students and professors of the school all the privileges of the Charity Hospital. He also procured from the Legislature an appropriation of $20,000 for enlarging the buildings and increasing the museum. The new school opened in 1856 with a class of seventy-six students. It closed its doors at the beginning of the civil war on two hundred and forty-seven, many of whom shouldered their muskets until the close of the fateful struggle per- mitted the survivors to resume their interrupted studies. The school was used as a negro school during Federal domination, but was reorganized and reopened in 1865. Dr. Peniston being dead, the chair of Anatomy was filled by Professor Henry F. Campbell, of Georgia, and that of Physiology by Dr. Alfred C. Holt of
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Mississippi. After a few sessions, and after the death of Dr. Fenner, the New Or- leans Sehool of Medicine ceased to exist.
Dr. Fenner originated the Louisiana Hospital in Richmond during the war and proved his devotion to his native South by refusing to take the oath of allegi- ance. He was banished by General Butler, and went to Mobile, where he remained until the end of the war. He returned to New Orleans when peace was established, resumed his extensive praetiee, and was pursuing his eareer with unabated energy, when he suddenly suceumbed to fever, May 4, 1866. Dr. Fenner was a man of soeiable and lovable eharaeter, and was remarkably devoted to ehildren. He left an honored name, which has been worthily borne by his son, Judge Charles E. Fenner.
One of the most widely-known physicians of New Orleans, remarkable alike for great talent and virile and heroic personality, was Dr. Warren Stone. He was professor of Surgery in the University of Louisiana for thirty-five years, and sur- geon of the Charity Hospital for thirty-nine, so that his name would seem to be identified with all that is wisest and best in the history of both institutions. He first saw the light in the remote town of St. Albans, Vt., in 1808. A fine mother gave him a frame of superb proportions and iron nerve, and a nature full of lofty ambition and honorable ideals. Dr. Stone's edueation was eondueted by private tutors, as the schools of that day were but poorly equipped, and he beeamc a pupil of Dr. Twitehell, an eminent surgeon and physieian of Keene, N. H. He fre- quently deelared that he was indebted to Dr. Twitchell for the most valuable portion of his extensive professional knowledge. He was an ardent student, and when he graduated from the medieal sehool in Pittsfield, Mass., in 1831 he was thoroughly equipped in all the practical branches of medieine. In 1832 he started from Boston, by sea, for New Orleans, but the brig Amelia met with violent storms, cholera ap- peared among the passengers and erew, and the unfortunate vessel finally ran aground on Folly Island, at the entrance to Charleston harbor. The unfortunate passengers were supplied by the generous people of Charleston with all needful and medieines, and Dr. Thomas Hunt, a distinguished physician, rendered devoted at- tention to the siek. The Amelia was burned as a necessary sanitary measure, but another vessel being chartered to convey the passengers and erew to their destination, Dr. Stone at last landed in New Orleans, friendless and poor, at a time when yellow fever and eholera were both raging. Through the kindness of Dr. Cenas, young Stone received some employment in connection with the Charity Hospital. His unusual ability and industry soon made a favorable impression upon all around him.
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When Dr. Hunt, with whom he formed a warm friendship during the sad days on Folly Island, removed to New Orleans from Charleston, and was appointed resident surgeon at the hospital, he secured for Dr. Stone the position of assistant to Dr. Picton. So clearly were his abilities demonstrated in this post that he was ap- pointed resident surgeon of the hospital in 1836. One of his biographers says, in reference to this advancement: "Never was so elevated a professional office so mer- itoriously acquired; never was one so ably and satisfactorily filled. Now was fully inaugurated a career never enjoyed by any surgeon in America. Known and en- deared to the people by his services in the hospital, particularly in the free dispensary, which was filled by a large and anxious crowd every mid-day in the week; elected in 1836 lecturer on Anatomy, and in January, 1837, professor of Anatomy by the petition of the admiring class, and, on the resignation of Prof. Lu- zenberg, lecturer on surgery, he became, at the next session, professor of Surgery, the leading and most eminent surgeon and physician in the city, the most cele- brated and popular professor in the school, until his resignation in 1872."
In November, 1849, Dr. Stone operated successfully in a case of traumatic aneurism of the vertebral artery, by incising the sac, turning out the coagulum and controlling the artery by a graduated compress. He also enjoys the humane distinction of being the first to use chloroform for the alleviation of suffering, in New Orleans, on the 25th of February, 1847.
Dr. Stone built and conducted a private infirmary at the corner of Canal and Claiborne, for some years, from 1859 to 1867. Dr. William Kennedy, a prominent physician of the day, was associated with Dr. Stone in this, and although much practical good was achieved, the enterprise was financially unsuccessful and was finally abandoned. At the outbreak of the war, Dr. Stone was appointed Confeder- ate surgeon-general of the State of Louisiana. He was present at the battles of Bull Run and Shiloh, and devoted his fine surgical skill to the alleviation of the wounded soldiers. When New Orleans was in the hands of the Federals, he was sent to Fort Jackson, where he treated the Federal soldiers free of charge. But, gladly as he rendered aid to the suffering, regardless of sectional or political feel- ing, he was never in the least "reconstructed," but remained to the end an en- thusiastic Democrat, the devoted friend of Jefferson Davis. Dr. Stone lost the sight of one eye in 1841 from an inflammation contracted from a little patient. Dr. Stone was a frequent contributor to the Medical Journal. Among his important articles may be mentioned "The Treatment of Wounded Arteries," "Ligation of the Common Iliac Artery," "Inflammation" (1859), and "Pulmonary Tuberculosis"
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(1866). The wise physician, so kind of heart, keen of wit, generous of hand, laid down the burden of his earthily eares, and entered into his rest, December 6, 1872.
Dr. T. G. Richardson, born in Lexington, Ky., in 1827, received a complete medical education in the University of Louisville, and afterwards enjoyed years of profitable intercourse with the celebrated Dr. Gross, whose private pupil he was. He was appointed demonstrator of Anatomy in the medieal department of the University of Louisville, immediately after his graduation in 1848. He accepted, in 1856, the chair of Anatomy in the Pennsylvania Medical College. He acquired a reputation at the age of twenty-nine, by the publication of a text-book entitled "Richardson's Elements of Human Anatomy." While in Philadelphia, Dr. Richardson edited, with Dr. Gross, the "North American Medico-Chirurgical Review." He removed to New Orleans in 1858, to oeeupy the chair of Anatomy in the Tulane University of Louisiana, which he retained until 1872. Dr. Rieh- ardson then accepted the chair of Surgery, which he occupied for seventeen years. He was dean of the medical department of Tulane University from 1865 to 1885, and was emeritus professor of Surgery until his death. Dr. Richardson was presi- dent of the American Medical Association during the year 1877-78, and presided at the session held in Buffalo. As surgeon of General Bragg's staff, Dr. Richardson followed the fortunes of war from 1862 to 1865, returning to his home, with a heart crushed by the defeat of his country and his eause. A terrible domestic bereavement was added to the sorrows of the patriot; he lost his wife and three children by the explosion and wreek of a Mississippi steamboat. These sorrows, endured with courage and submission, probably emphasized the eold reserve and dignity of his manner. His devoted friend, Dr. Edmond Souchon, tells a story which illustrates his eourage and devotion to duty. Being ealled to a patient who was bleeding profusely, he introduced the tiny silver eanula into the vein at the elbow, and in the simplest way told Dr. Souehon, his assistant, to introduce the other end into his (Dr. Richardson's) vein, thus giving his own blood to restore the patient, but in vain. Dr. Richardson died on May 26, 1892, but a noble memorial has been erected to him by his wife, Mrs. Ida A. Richardson, in the superbly fitted medical college, for the building of which she donated one hundred thousand dollars.
Dr. Samuel M. Bemiss was of Revolutionary stock. His father was thrown early on his own resources, and acquired a medical education in the face of eount- less difficulties. He settled in Kentucky, where Dr. Samuel Bemiss was born. He enjoyed the distinetion of being the first matrieulate of the University of New York,
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where he graduated in 1845. He, too, like the other doctors we have mentioned, bore a gallant part in the troubled years from '61 to '65, serving as surgeon in the Confederate army. At the termination of the war, he returned to Louisville, but shortly after, in 1866, he accepted the chair of Theory and Practice of Medicine in the University of Louisiana, which he filled up to the day of his death. Dr. Bemiss was noted for conservative opinion, and careful and painstaking practice. In 1878 he was chairman of a commission appointed to investigate the origin and spread of yellow fever in the interior of Louisiana. He visited a number of infected towns and made an elaborate report of his investigations. Dr Bemiss was for some years senior editor of the New Orleans Medical and Surgical Journal, and his facile pen contributed to numerous scientific magazines. He was a member of the American Medical Association, the College of Physicians and Sur- geons of Louisville, of the Kentucky State Medical Society, of the Boston Gynæco- logical Society, and of the State Medical Association of Louisiana. Dr. Bemiss died the 17th of November, 1884.
Dr. Samuel Choppin, born in Baton Rouge, in 1828, graduated at the Univer- sity of Louisiana, in 1849. He spent two years in Paris to complete his medical education, and while there witnessed the coup d'état of Louis Napoleon in 1851, and but narrowly escaped with his life, on one occasion, being one of a defenseless crowd, which was suddenly and unexpectedly fired upon by soldiers. On his return to New Orleans he was appointed demonstrator of Anatomy in the Medical College, a position which he held for five years, and during the same period he was house surgeon of the Charity Hospital. He devoted much time to the literature of medicine, and was associate editor of the New Orleans Medical and Hospital Gazette, which printed his "Notes on Syphilis." In conjunction with Drs. E. D. Fenner, D. W. Brickell and C. Beard, Dr. Choppin took an active part in organiz- ing the New Orleans School of Medicine in 1856. He served as medical inspector, and surgeon-in-chief to General Beauregard and was present at the siege of Charles- ton and Petersburg. On his return to New Orleans, after the war, he formed a partnership with Dr. C. Beard. His deepest sympathies were enlisted in the struggle of his native State with the radical despotism, and he was one of the leaders and organizers of the revolution of September 14, 1874. Dr. Choppin was president of the Board of Health in 1876. He made a gallant struggle to protect the community from the invasion of yellow fever, but failed in 1878. The treachery of sceming friends, the misrepresentations of the press, embittered his last years. He died of pneumonia, on May 2, 1880.
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Dr. John Dickson Bruns was a man of rare culture, who united to pro- fessional ability the charm of fine scholarship and poetic talents. Born in Charleston, S. C., February 24, 1836, he graduated at the Medical College of South Carolina in 1857, on which occasion his thesis entitled "Life, its Relations, Animal and Mental," won a prize of one hundred dollars. After traveling in the North, and attending lectures there, Dr. Bruns returned to Charleston, and edited the Charleston Medical Journal in 1858. He was the friend of Sims, the novelist, and of the gentle poet Timrod, delighting both by his youthful enthusiasm and eloquence. He married in 1858. After the fall of the Con- federacy, which had been the object of his devoted allegiance, Dr. Bruns spent several months in Europe, and in the autumn of the same year (1866) accepted the chair of Physiology and Pathology in the Medical School of New Orleans. He was afterwards elected professor of Practice of Medicine in the Charity Hospital Medical School. He was associated for several years with Drs. Choppin, Beard and Brickell, in practice. His pen was ever active and his poems are full of chaste and delicate fancy. "'Morituri Salutamus' is a poem," said the Times-Democrat, "which we fully believe deserves a permanent place in the gallery of English chef d'œuvres." His most brilliant scientific papers appeared in the Southern Journal of Medical Science (1867) and in the New Orleans Medical and Surgical Journal (1880).
A noted name in the list of New Orleans surgeons is that of Dr. A. W. Smyth. He held for many years the position of house surgeon in the Charity Hospital, to which he was elected in 1862. Dr. Smyth's unusual mechanical gifts led to the introduction of many improvements in the domestic arrangements of the hospital. But his fame rests securely upon the fact that he was the first surgeon who suc- cessfully performed the operation of tying the innominata, the vertebral, and other arteries for the cure of subclavian aneurism. Dr. Smyth was a graduate of the Medical College of Louisiana. An Irishman by birth, he has returned to his native land to spend his declining years.
The pathos of an early death, a brilliant career brought to an untimely closc, is associated with the name of Dr. Albert B. Miles, one of the most esteemed phy- sicians of late years. Dr. Miles was a native of Alabama, and was born in 1852. An education begun in the Gordon Institute of Arkansas was completed at the · University of Virginia in 1870, when he graduated at the age of eighteen. Coming to New Orleans in 1872, he began the study of medicine, and became a resident student in Charity Hospital, April 7, 1873. He graduated in 1875, and was at once
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elected demonstrator of Anatomy in the medical department of the University. After filling the position of visiting physician to the Hospital and of assistant house surgeon, he was appointed physician in charge of the Hotel Dieu, and in 1882, house surgeon of Charity Hospital, which he remained until his death, of typhoid fever, August 5, 1894. He made a gallant struggle for life, and when gently in- formed that the end was near, exclaimed, "So soon !" A sentiment soon echoed by the whole community, which had expected so mueh from this brilliant and useful life ! Dr. Miles was a member of the New Orleans Medical and Surgical Associa- tion, of the Orleans Parish Medical Association, and of the Louisiana State Medieal Society.
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