History of Worcester County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II, Part 159

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton)
Publication date: 1889
Publisher: Philadelphia : J.W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1464

USA > Massachusetts > Worcester County > History of Worcester County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II > Part 159

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1831 .- DR. JOHN PARK, A.B. (Dartmouth, 1791), although never in active practice, resided here for many years. He was born in Windham, N. H., in 1775. From 1793 to 1801 he served in the West Indies, at first as surgeon in the English service and later in the United States Navy. He settled in Newburyport and later moved to Boston, retired from practice, and, in 1811, opened the Boston Lyceum for young ladies. which he successfully managed for twenty years. From 1831 to his death, in 1852, he was in Worces- ter. He was a member of the Antiquarian Society, to which he presented the greater part of his library. A daughter was the wife of the late Benjamin F. Thomas. Another became the second wife of Rev. Dr. E. B. Hall, of Providence, R. I., father of Rev. Edward H. Hall, who from 1869-82 was the pastor of the Second ( Unitarian) Church.

1833 .- SAMUEL B. WOODWARD, M.D., son of Dr. Samuel Woodward,1 himself a physician of ability,

1 Dr. Samuel Woodward was in practice in Torringford for nearly sixty years. He was distinguished not only in his profession, but in

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was born in Torringford, Conn., June 10, 1787. He studied medicine with his father, and, having been licensed to practice by the Connecticut State Medical Society in 1809, assisted him for a year or more, and then removed to Wethersfield, near Hartford. Here he remained twenty-two years, for a large part of the time the only physician in the place. During this period he was elected secretary of the Connecticut Medical Society ; vice-president of the Hopkins Medical Society, and one of the medical examiners of Yale College, from which, in 1822, he received the degree of M.D. From 1827-33 he was physician to the Connecticut State Prison. He became early in- terested in the subject of insanity, and, in 1824, was strongly urged for the position of superintendent of the Bloomingdale Asylum, then opened in the State of New York. He was largely instrumental in the establishment of the Hartford Retreat for the Insane, traveling over the greater part of the State of Connecti- cut in his doctor's gig, explaining its necessity and soliciting funds. Some negotiations took place for his taking charge of this institution, but he used his influence in favor of his friend, Dr. Eli Todd, who was appointed. On the latter's death, in 1834, the position was again offered him, and in 1840 the offer was repeated, with the promise of a home outside the hospital walls. These offers, as well as a similar one, in 1842, from the trustees of the then new asylum in Utica, N. Y., were declined ; but while in Wethers- field he served on the Board of Visitors of the Hart- ford institution, and "devoted to its prosperity the weight of his personal exertions and influence." In 1832 came the call to take charge of the asylum then in process of erection in Worcester, which call he accepted, came here in 1833, and remained almost without rest for fourteen years. In 1846, with shat- tered health, he retired to Northampton, where he died January 3, 1850, at the age of fifty-three. Dr. Woodward was an honorary member of the Massa- chusetts Medical Society from 1833, and of the Con- necticut State Society from 1835. In 1832 he represented the Hartford district in the State Senate, his object in accepting the position being the further- ance, by legislation, of the interests of the insane, whose acknowledged champion he already was. In 1838 he became a fellow of the Albany Medical Col- lege. He was the first president of the Association of Insane Asylum Superintendents and the founder of the society ; a member of the Ohio State Medical So- ciety and Ohio Historical Society. He wrote much for medical and other scientific journals, and, from 1828-43, delivered occasional lectures on temperance and education throughout Connectient and Massachu- setts. Of the Massachusetts School for Idiotic Youth he was a firm friend, and, as early as 1840, had pre-

pared a plan for an asylum for inebriates, of which he would willingly have been superintendent. The times were, however, not ripe; the plan was cousid- ered chimerical and the project abandoned. An authority on the subject of insanity, and occupying the position of a reformer in its treatment, his private correspondence shows that his opinion was sought by physicians of reputation, not only in this State, but throughout America. Dr. Edward Jarvis, in 1842, calls him "the leader in the great reform in the management of the insane," and says that the ex- ample of the hospital and its reports "have done more than any other thing to extend this reformation throughout the Union." Personally popular, on his removal to Worcester six hundred and seventy of the inhabitants of Wethersfield signed a memorial of their regard for his person, respect for his talents and regret at his removal; and, after his departure for Northampton, his bust was placed in the corridor of the Lunatic Hospital by the people of Worcester, while the trustees individually subscribed for the portrait now at the asylum. Six feet two and one- half inches in height, and weighing two hundred and sixty pounds, Dr. Woodward commanded attention wherever he appeared. Of his personal appearance, Mr. Stanton, in his reminiscences, says : " I boarded in Boston at the United States Hotel. Whenever he visited the city, Dr. Samuel B. Woodward, principal of the Insane Asylum at Worcester, dined there. As he walked, erect and majestic, through the long room to the head of the table, every knife and fork rested and all eyes centred on him. He received similar notice when appearing as an expert in the courts. The reason was this: young men who saw George Washington after he passed middle life traced the very close resemblance between him and Dr. Wood- ward."

1834 .- AARON G. BABCOCK, M. D., son of Amos Bab- cock, of Princeton, where he studied medicine with Dr. Chandler Smith, graduated at the Bowdoin Medical School in 1830. For four years he practised medicine in Holden, then came to Worcester, where he was at first physician, and later physician and druggist. From his drug-store was developed the present ex- tensive establishment of Jerome Marble & Co.

1835 .- WILLIAM WORKMAN, M.D., was born in Colraine, Mass., in 1798, and was fitted for college at Hopkins Academy, in old Hadley. His health failed, he was unable to graduate and was twenty-four years of age before he began to study medicine. After a three years' course with Drs. Washburn, of Greenfield, Flint & Mather, of Northampton, and at the Harvard Medical School, he received his degree in 1825, and immediately opened an office in Shrewsbury. In 1835 he came to Worcester and continued in active practice until 1869, when, at the age of seventy-one, he retired. He died sixteen years later (October 17, 1885), at the age of eighty-seven. Dr. Workman was a member of the American Medical Association, and

political life ; was for twenty years a member of the Legislature, and from 1800-10 Democratic candidate for Congress. Ile died January 26, 1835, aged eighty-four. Of his six sons four studied medicine, and all were in practice in Connecticut at one and the same time.

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for twenty-four years councillor of the Massachusetts Medical Society. In 1854 he delivered the annual address before that body, it being the second time that the honor had been conferred upon a Wor- cester physician. In 1862, requested to send ont sur- geons to care for the wounded of the "Seven Days' Fight," he attended to that duty, and although in his sixty-fourth year, went himself to the front. He was connected with the School Board of town and city from 1840 to 1859, was president of the Worcester Lyceum, and from 1862 to '72 trustee of the Worcester Lunatic Hospital. He married, in 1828, Sarah P. Hemenway. His son, William H. Workman, M.D., was in practice here from 1873 to '87.

1836 .- JOHN A. ANDREWS, M.D., who is the oldest physician in the city, was born in Hopkinton, Sep- tember 30, 1802, and has been fifty-two years in practice here. In 1850 and '51 he was connected with the Worcester Medical Institution.

1836 .- CHANDLER SMITH, M.D., born in Peru, Berkshire County, in 1803, graduated at the Berkshire Medical School in 1825, and for ten years practised in Princeton. From 1836 until his death-June 28, 1843-he lived in Worcester, and for four years of the time was town physician. He was a trustee of the Worcester Manual Labor High School.

1840 .- JOSEPH SARGENT, M.D., A.B. (Harvard, 1834), son of Colonel Henry Sargent, was born in Leicester, December 31, 1815. He studied medicine one year with Dr. Edward Flint, of Leicester, and three at a private school in Boston, of which Dr. James Jackson was the head, attending lectures at the medi- cal schools of Harvard University and in Philadel- phia. After receiving his degree of M.D. from Har- vard, in 1837, he spent one year as house-officer in the Massachusetts General Hospital, and two years in study in Paris, and in 1840 opened an office in Wor- cester. In 1850 he spent another year in study in Europe, and visited it again in 1868.

For forty-eight years Dr. Sargent has been a leader in the medical profession. Holding, in turn, all the offices in the District Society, he was councillor in the State Society for a long time, and in 1874-76 vice- president. He was one of the original members of the Boston Society for Medical Observation, and the first ont-of-town member of the Boston Society for Medical Improvement. He founded the Worcester Medical Improvement Society. To his exertions is largely due the present prosperity of the City Hospital of which he was trustee from 1871 to 1886, serving at the same time as a member of the consulting staff. From 1843 to 1848 he was a trustee of the Worcester Lunatic Hospital, and is at present, and has always heen, a trustee of the Memorial Hospital and Dispen- sary. He has been medical director of the State Mutnal Life Insurance Company since 1844. At his sugges- tion gas was introduced into Worcester, and he is president of the Worcester Gas Company. He is a

trustee of Clark University. He married Emily Whitney September 27, 1841.

[The death of Dr. Sargent, on October 13, 1888, since the above sketch was prepared, makes it proper here to add a few words. It is impossible, however, within the limits imposed upon us, to do justice to the character and position of the doctor. He brought to Worcester a store of knowledge and skill, which made him pre-eminently the most conspicuous mem- ber of the profession in Central Massachusetts, and which would have secured for him fame and success in whatever field of practice he should have selected anywhere. This position he maintained throughout his lifetime. He was, at the same time, a public- spirited citizen, and his services to leading local in- stitutions, as well as to the body politic, were of the highest value. The natural refinement of his char- acter served to elevate the tone of any circle or any business interest with which he was connected. A more full acquaintance with the life of Dr. Sargent inay be obtained from the biographical sketches and the proceedings of the various bodies with which he was connected, which appeared in the Worcester Spy and Evening Gazette immediately following his death, and also from the printed " Proceedings of the Amer- ican Antiquarian Society," at their meeting on Octo- ber 22, 1888 .- C.]

1840 .- CALVIN NEWTON, M.D., was born in South- boro' in 1801, and was educated for the ministry. For a number of years he was settled over a church in Great Barrington, and was later Professor of Rhetoric and Hebrew in Waterville College, Waterville, Maine. Deciding to study medicine, he attended lectures at the Berkshire Medical School, where he graduated in 1840. He immediately opened an office in Worcester. In 1846 he established a medical journal, known as the N. E. Medical Eclectic, and later as the Worcester Journal of Medicine. This he continned to edit nntil his death. He lectured to classes of students, and devoted all liis energies to the establishment of a school which should raise the standard of practice of those persons known as eclectic or botanic physi- cians. In this he succeeded, against great opposition, but wore himself ont in the attempt, and died in August, 1853, aged fifty-two. He was president of the Worcester Medical Institution and Professor of Pathology. He was, also, in 1852, president of the National Eclectic Medical Society.

1845 .- BENJAMIN HEYWOOD, M.D., A.B. (Harvard, 1840), son of Dr. Benjamin F. Heywood, was born in Worcester, July 16, 1821. He studied medicine four years at the University of Pennsylvania, graduated in 1844, and after one year spent in study in Europe, came to Worcester, where his ability was soon recognized, both by the profession and the community. He prac- tised medicine here for fifteen years ; was from 1847-54 secretary, treasurer and 'librarian of the District Society, and in 1859, surgeon of the Tenth Regiment of Militia. He died July 21, 1860, aged thirty-nine.

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1845 .- RUFUS WOODWARD, M.D., A.B. (Harvard, 1841), was theson of Dr. Samuel B. Woodward, and born in Wethersfield, Connecticut, October 3, 1819. He was fitted in the Worcester schools for Harvard College, which he entered in 1837. After graduation he began the study of medicine with Dr. Joseph Sargent, and in 1842 entered the llarvard Medical School, where he graduated three years later. For three years he was assistant physician at the State Lunatic Hospital, and then spent two years in study in Europe, devoting much time to the subject of insanity, with the inten- tion of assisting his father in a private asylum for mental diseases in Northampton. His plans were changed by the latter's sudden death, in 1850, and on his return to this country, soon after, he established himself in general practice in Worcester. For thirty- three years he devoted himself to his profession, seeing patients on the very day of his own sudden death, December 30, 1885, at the age of sixty-six. A member of local and State Medical Societies, he was, during the war of 1861-65, examining surgeon for vol- unteers, and in 1862 volunteer surgeon under the Sani- tary Commission. From 1863-66 he was city physician. and on the formation of the Board of Health, in 1877 was induced to again accept this position, which he held at the time of his death, being also chairman of the hoard, of which he was ex-officio a member. From 1871-1880 he was visiting surgeon to the City Hospital, consulting surgeon to the Washburn Dis- pensary from 1874 until his death, and was also phy; sician to the House of Correction, and to the Orphans Home. For twelve years he was a member of the School Board, and from 1861 a member of the Anti- qnarian Society. In natural history and botany he was always greatly interested ; he was, in college, a member of the Harvard Natural History Society, and was one of the founders and for many years pres- ident of the local society. Much of his spare time was spent in his garden, and that wild flower whose haunts, in the neighborhood of Worcester, he did not know, was rare indeed.

1845 .- SAMUEL F. GREEN, M.D., a grandson of the first Dr. John Green, was born here October 10, 1822, studied medicine with Dr. McVicker, in New York, graduated from the College of Physicians and Surgeons in 1845, and immediately settled in Worcester. A year later he became physician to the American Board, and went to Ceylon. Learning the Tamil language, he established a college for the education of young men in European medicine and surgery. For twenty-one years he lived there, teaching, attending to an extensive practice, and at the same time per- formning the tremendous task of editing, in Tamil, a complete set of works on medicine. His health was undermined by the climate; he was obliged to return to America, and the last years of his life were spent in Worcester. Wishing to continne his work, the manuscript was, for a long time, prepared here, sent to India, and the proof's in Tamil returned for revision

and correction. He completed text-books on Obstet- rics, Surgery, Anatomy, Physiology, Physics and Chemistry, and parts of works on the Pharmacopria of India, and Medical Jurisprudence-in all three thousand six hundred pages. Many of these are standard in India, and a small annual appropriation to assist in defraying the expense of preparing them was allowed him by the English Government. He died in the Green Hill house, May 28, 1884.

1845 .- GEORGE A. BATES, M.D., son of Dr. Anson Bates, of Barre, where he was born in 1820, studied medicine with his brother, Dr. Joseph N. Bates, in that town, and with Dr. N. S. Perry, of Boston. attending also lectures at the Berkshire and Harvard Medical Schools. He graduated from the latter in 1844, and began practice in Barre. In 1845 he came to Worcester, where, with one interval of five years, he remained until his sudden death, August 9, 1885. In 1856 he removed to Washington, D. C., returning in 1861, when his brother left Worcester as surgeon of the Fifteenth Regiment. From 1844 he was a member of the Massachusetts Medical Society ; from 1871-83 surgeon at the City Hospital, and, at the time of his death, surgeon of the Worcester Continentals. Never married, he almost lived in his office, where he surrounded himself with old furniture and curi- osities of every description. In fact, so great was the accumulation that many were, of necessity, packed away and unearthed only after his death.

1845 .- SAMUEL FLAGG, M.D., A.B. (Dartmouth, 1841), son of Samuel Flagg, was born in Worcester July 16, 1821. He studied medicine with Dr. Amos Twitchell, in Keene, N. H., and at the University of Pennsylvania, where he graduated in 1845. In prac- tice in Worcester until 1861; he was from 1852 con- nected with the militia, at first as assistant surgeon of the Eighth Regiment, and later as surgeon of the Third Battalion of Rifles. He went to the front in 1861 as hospital steward in the Twenty-fifth Regi- ment, and in 1862 was commissioned assistant sur- geon. For two years he was on detail duty in vari- ous hospitals and forts in North Carolina. In 1863 he resigned ou account of ill health, but soon after went as contract surgeon to the Government Hospital on Long Island, Boston Harbor, remaining there and at Galloupes Island until 1865. Since 1881 he has lived in his cottage on the shores of Lake Quinsiga- mond. From 1867-69 he was surgeou of the Tenth Regiment Massachusetts Volunteer Militia, and from 1869-77 surgeon and medical director of the Third Brigade.

1845 .- WORCESTER SOCIETY FOR MEDICAL IM- PROVEMENT, organized for "medical improvement and the cultivation of good-fellowship." It was dis- continued in 1846, revived in 1857, and continued until 1874. In 1876 it was re-organized, and until 1886 meetings were held every alternate Wednesday even- ing, from September to June, at the house of mem- bers in turn. Each member was chairman of his own

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meeting and read a paper on some scientific subject. There were usually about twenty medical men con- nected with the society. Its meetings are for the present suspended.

1846 .- R. L. HAWES, M.D., was born in Leomin- ster, March 22, 1823. After graduating at the Har- vard Medical . School (1845), where he took high rank, he began practice in Worcester; but, having invented a machine for folding envelopes, soon turned. his attention to business. He died in travelling in Europe in 1867.

1846 .- ARMET B. DELAND, in practice here for forty-three years, was born in Brookfield in 1823. He studied medicine with Dr. George Bates and attended lectures at Pittsfield, Mass., Castleton, Vt., and Charleston, S. C.

1847 .- HENRY SARGENT, M.D., A.B. (Yale, 1841), son of Colonel Henry Sargent, was born in Leicester, November 7, 1821. His medical studies were pursued with his brother, Dr. Joseph Sargent, with Drs. Bow- ditch, of Boston, and Gerhardt, of Philadelphia, and at the Harvard Medical School, from which he grad- nated in 1847, having previously spent two years in Enrope, largely in the hospitals of Paris. His health was never good after 1844, when he was poisoned at an autopsy, and he was repeatedly obliged to with- draw from business, visiting Europe in 1851 and again in 1854. With these exceptions, he was in practice in Worcester from the time of his graduation until his death, April 26, 1858, at the age of thirty-six. He was highly esteemed by the profession in Worcester, and to an unusual degree beloved by the community. His wife was Catherine Whitney, to whom he was married in May, 1849. She died in September of the same year.

1848 .- PIERRE B. MIGNAULT (of Acadian ances- try) was born in the parish of Chambly. Province of Quebec, August 28, 1818. He became involved in the "Rebellion of '37," and was forced to flee the country. He reached the frontier after various adven- tures, worked his way to Burlington and later to Bos- ton, and entered the Harvard Medical School, where he graduated in 1846. For two years he practised in Boston, and then came to Worcester, where he re- mained until 1871, living on Trumbull Square. He now resides in Montreal. In Worcester he was widely known as "The French doctor," and was largely in- terested in the Sisters' Hospital.

1848 .- MERRICK BENIS, M.D., was born in Stur- bridge, Mass., in 1820; studied medicine with Drs. Gilmore, of Brookfield, and Winslow Lewis, of Bos- ton, and received his degree from the Castleton (Vt.) Medical School in 1848. For eight years he was assistant to Dr. Chandler, at the Lunatic Hospital, and in 1856 succeeded him as superintendent. In 1872 he resigned the position and established the private asylum known as Herbert Hall. A member of various medical societies, Dr. Bemis is president of the Worcester Medical Association. During the War

of 1861-65 he did much to encourage recruiting. He has served on the School Committee and in 1860 was a member of the Board of Aldermen. For years he has been prominently identified with the Natural History Society.

1850 .- ORAMEL MARTIN, M.D., was born in Hoo- sick, N. Y., July 21, 1810. He attended lectures at the medical schools of Pittsfield, Mass., and Castleton, Vt., from 1829 to 1832, receiving diplomas from both places. In 1833 he began practice in New Braintree. The years 1845-46 he spent in study in the hospitals of Paris. Returning, he practised two years in North Brookfield and two in Hopkinton, and in 1850 re- moved to Worcester, where he has since remained. "He participated largely in the Anti-Slavery move- ment and in the formation of the Republican party." In 1861 he went to the front as surgeon of the Third Battalion of Rifles. In August of the same year he was commissioned brigade surgeon by President Lin- coln. Invalided after four months' service at Fort McHenry, he no sooner recovered his health than he went to Missouri on General Hunter's staff, and was placed in charge of the hospital village of Otterville, with twelve hundred patients. He was then sent to Kansas, and, after the battle of Pittsburgh Landing, was placed in charge of the Pacific Hospital in St. Louis. Later he was on General Granger's staff in Mississippi, but his health again gave out, and he was obliged to send in his resignation in June, 1862. Un- til the end of the war he was surgeon of the Board of Enrollment. From 1862 he was also examiner of pensioners ; at first alone, and afterwards as one of a board of three, until 1886, when, with one of his col- leagues, Dr. J. M. Rice, he was, for political reasons, removed. He is a member of the American Medical Society and of the Massachusetts and Vermont State Societies. He was surgeon of the City Hospital until 1882, and is now a member of the consulting staff. He is also consulting physician to the Washburn Dispensary.

1850 .- DEAN TOWNE, M.D., born in Windsor, Vt. February 7, 1810 ; studied medicine in Woodstock, Vt., and graduated at Castleton in 1833. He practiced twelve years in Windsor, Vt., six years in Shrewsbury, and has, since 1850, been in Worcester. He practi- cally retired from business many years ago.

1851 .- HENRY CLARKE, M.D., was the son of Benja- min Clarke, a prosperous farmer of Marlboro', Mass., where he was born October 3, 1824. Spending some years at the academies of Marlboro' and Leicester, he began his professional studies in the office of Dr. Henry Sargent in 1847. In 1848 he entered the Har- vard Medical School, where he distinguished himself and received the Boylston prize. He graduated in 1850, and, after a year spent in the hospitals of Paris and Vienna, began practice in Worcester in 1851. To his practice he devoted himself with. a zeal and industry that often overtaxed his physical strength, never very robust, and, in 1861, in 1867, and again in

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History of Worcester County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II, Part 159

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) Publication date: 1889 Publisher: Philadelphia : J.W. Lewis & Co. Number of Pages: 1464

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton)
Publication date: 1889
Publisher: Philadelphia : J.W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1464