USA > Michigan > Wayne County > Chronography of notable events in the history of the Northwest territory and Wayne County > Part 42
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At the age of seventeen years, with the aid of an assistant, he conducted a school at sixteen dollars a month and board, which in those days was considered large pay. This was his first and last experience in teaching.
In 1842, he began the study of medicine under Dr. Joseph F. Potter, at Waterville, Me., and pursued his studies there till the fall of 1844, when he took his first course of lectures at the Medical Depart- ment of Harvard University. He also took that winter, 1844-5, pri- vate instruction in auscultation and percussion of the eminent teacher, the venerable Dr. H. I. Bowditch, now living in Boston. He graduated from the Jefferson Medical College, Philadelphia, in March, 1846. He also took while in Philadelphia a practical course of instruction in phy- sical diagnosis of diseases of the chest of the noted teacher, Dr. Girard, of that city. In July following, he was appointed Assistant Physician for one year in the U. S. Marine Hospital at Chelsea, Mass., under Dr. George B. Loring, now Minister to Portugal. While he was at Chelsea he went to Boston, and was present at the Massachusetts General Hospital on October 16, 1846, and witnessed the first public administration of an "anæsthetic " (ether) in surgery in the world, then called "Letheon," by Dr. William T. G. Morton, a dentist in Boston, which has proved to be the greatest discovery and boon to humanity of the nineteenth century. In the winter of 1847, he attended medical lectures and visited the hospitals and clinics in New York and Philadelphia. Among the noted men he heard lecture that winter were Dr. Valentine Mott, the greatest American surgeon of that day, and Drs. Martin, Payne and Draper, in New York, and Drs. Gibson, Chapman, Wood and Horner, in Philadelphia.
March 14, 1848, he was present and gave important expert testi- mony in the great trial of Dr. Valorus P. Coolidge, at Augusta, Maine, for the murder of Edward Mathews, at Waterville, he having been the first to detect the presence of prussic acid from its odor in the contents of the stomach and at the autopsy which he himself made, which was sustained by chemical analysis, and led to his conviction of the murder. It being the first case in this country in which this deadly poison had
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been used to commit murder, it attracted unusual interest and notoriety. In his trial the prisoner was ably defended by his brother, Edwin Noyes, and the Hon. George Evans.
In 1849 he settled and commenced practice at Waterville, Me., and promptly adopted in diagnosis and treatment of disease all the instru- mental aids then known and in use, and gained a large and successful practice. Desiring to pursue still further his professional studies, he spent the winter of that year again at his " Alma Mater" in Phil- adelphia.
In 1852, upon the urgent advice of his former preceptor, Dr. Potter, who, upon his return from Europe, had removed and gained a very large and lucrative practice in Cincinnati, he sold out his practice and went to that city and entered at once into a good practice with him. From there he made, October 3d, 1853, his first visit to Detroit, his brother then being Superintendent of the M. C. Railroad, crossing the lake from Sandusky, there being at that day no railroad to Detroit. The city then had a population of about thirty thousand. Returning to Cincinnati he passed through Chicago, which had a population of about forty thousand.
The climate and failing health obliged him to leave Cincinnati, and in June, 1854, he embarked in a sailing vessel at New York for Europe, with special reference to the study of ophthalmology, in com- pany with Raphael Pumpelly, late professor in Harvard University, author of an interesting book of travels, " Across America and Asia," and now of the United States Geological Survey. After a delightful and remarkable voyage of only eighteen days from Sandy Hook, he arrived at the mouth of the Elba, leading up to Hamburg. He visited Han- over, and with Pumpelly, entered the Polytechnic School and took instruc- tion in anatomical drawings and pursued the study of the German lan- guage. The winter following he visited Berlin and commenced the study of opthalmology under the celebrated Professor Albrecht Von Graefe, and opthalmoscopy with his assistant, Dr. Richard Liebreich. It was while he was a student that Graefe made those discoveries and researches which have contributed largely to the advancement of ophthalmic science and immortalized his name. He also took a private course of instruc- tion in operative surgery of Professor Langenbeck (Baron and after- wards Surgeon-General) of the Empire, and received from him many courteous favors. He not only visited his clinics and attended his lec- tures, but was invited and witnessed some of his private operations in the city. He visited Charity Hospital, and attended the lectures of Virchow, Traube and others. While in Berlin he had the very great pleasure of visiting, by invitation (April 17th, 1855), at his residence in the city, the illustrious German savant and traveler, Alexander Von Humboldt, then in his eighty-sixth year. The conversation was con-
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ducted in English, which he spoke with ease and fluency. He remarked he preferred the Spanish for conversation to any language with which he was conversant. He spoke of his visit to America, and it seemed to him, he said, " almost antediluvian," it was so long ago. He said it was during the Presidency of Jefferson, a very brilliant period in American history, and that we had " statesmen in those days." He was well acquainted, he said, with both Jefferson and Gallatan, and corresponded with them for a long time. When the visit had lasted about twenty minutes his servant announced, "The carriage is at the door." His excellency then said he regretted he must leave, as the time had arrived for him to go to San Soucie, as was his custom, and dine with the King. At this point he politely requested his auto- graph, which he gave, saying he was "half an American himself." He had also the pleasure of meeting the great American traveler, George Catlin, whose life and travels among the North American Indians he had read in his younger days with stirring interest. He had come to Berlin, he said, with the hope of disposing of his collection of portraits of North American Indian chiefs and curios which our Gov- ernment had, in a spirit of questionable economy, refused to purchase. He had already had an interview with Baron Von Humboldt, who at once took an interest in his collection, and had brought it to the notice of the King, who had ordered ten of his Indian portraits to be pur- chased for the Ethnographical Society of Berlin.
On October 2d, 1855, Dr. Noyes went to Prague and attended the lectures and clinics of Professors Arlt and Petha, to the latter of whom he bore a letter of introduction, and who entertained him delightfully at a dinner party at his beautiful home. At the table, conversing upon " spirit rappings" of the Fox girls, he was greatly surprised to hear Mrs. Petha, an English lady by birth, hold conversation in four lan- guages with the guests present. He left Prague November 4th, 1855, for Vienna, and after spending nine months there taking instruction of Prof. Edward Jaeger, in ophthalmology, and attending the lectures and clinics of Oppolzer, Skoda, Hyrtl and others at the General Hos- pital, he left the city and returned to Hamburg, and September 5th, 1856, embarked as surgeon on an emigrant ship, with five hundred emigrants on board, bound for New York. After a very stormy and eventful voyage of more than thirty days, arrived all well.
He went to Waterville, Me., and entered upon a large practice, mainly in the line of his specialty. At a meeting of the Maine Medical Association, convened at Lewiston, he exhibited the first ophthalmo- scope and introduced ophthalmology into Maine, and explained its practical use to the members present, and spoke of the great advance the great discovery of Helmholtz had already given to ophthalmic medicine in Europe. He performed, while at Waterville, a large num-
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ber of operations for hard and soft cataract and strabismus; and August 15th, 1857, he made the first operation (iridectomy, Graefe's opera- tion) for glaucoma in this country. He left Waterville, and January 4th, 1858, he again took passage for Europe in the steamer North Star, side-wheel steamer, and after a very stormy and perilous voyage, the ship nearly foundering, landed at Havre. The Rev. Mr. Bliss and wife, and Miss Barbour, missionaries to Constantinople, were among the passengers on board. Soon after his arrival in Paris he was pres- ent and witnessed, January 14th, 1858, the attempt made by Orsini and Pieri to assassinate the Emperor in front of the Opera House. He stood within thirty feet of the Emperor's carriage, when three hand grenades were thrown at the carriage and exploded in rapid succession. Many about him were killed and a large number wounded. Two months thereafter, March 13th, he was present and witnessed their decapitation by the guillotine.
In Paris he took instruction in opthalmology of Drs. Desmarres and Sichel, and attended the lectures and clinics of Prof. Velpeau, Neleton, Chassaignac, Record and Becerel, at the hospitals, and instruction at the Ecole Pratique. At the Charita he took private instruction of the head interne in systematic examination and physical diagnosis of disease. He was instrumental in 1858, in obtaining for Dr. N. Bozeman, then on a visit to Paris for the purpose of introducing his method of operating for vesico vaginal fistula, now of New York, a patient in the service of M. Robert at the Hotel Dieu, and assisted him in this the first operation for vesico vaginal fistula by the Amer- ican method performed on the continent of Europe. It was entirely successful, notwithstanding the patient had already submitted to two unsuccessful operations by surgeons of Paris. He reported the case and the operation in the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal. It was a triumph for American surgery, and the beginning in Europe of a new and more successful method of operating in this class of cases. While in Paris, he was elected a member of the American Medical Society there.
Having completed his studies in Paris he crossed over to London and walked the hospitals and visited the eye and ear clinics of Bow- man and Crichett. While he was in Germany, Austria and France he had the means and traveled extensively in Europe during the vaca- tions.
June 15th, 1859, he took passage on the steamer Europe at Liver- pool for Boston, and arrived in eleven days. He resumed practice in Waterville and again acquired a large general and surgical practice and also in his specialty. Patients came to him from distant parts of the State. He cut twice successfully for stone, the latter operation being the recto-vesical using Sims' silver wire suture to close up the wound.
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It was the second operation made in this way in this country. It was at Waterville that he met with and treated his first case of diphtheria (August 12th, 1860), in this country. It spread and became a very malignant epidemic in the Kenebeck Valley, and soon thereafter broke out in different parts of the country.
He was in practice in Waterville when the war broke out, and in a patriotic spirit he promptly offered his services to Governor Wash- burn and also to Governor Sprague, of Rhode Island, his native State, but was informed by his adjutant June 11th, 1861, that there was no vacancy in the First Rhode Island Regiment, then about to leave for Washington. Appointed and commissioned by Governor Washburn, he examined volunteers at Waterville for the war which went to make up the Third Maine Regiment, quartered and mustered into the United States service at Augusta. The Governor also offered him the appointment of " government surgeon at $135 per month, or the place of surgeon of one of the volunteer regiments then in the field or one of the new ones being organized," but he did not, out of necessity, accept these offers, but continued on in practice of his profession, looking for- ward to a larger field of work.
In 1863, March 4th, he settled permanently in Detroit. He brought over from Europe and took into Michigan the first opthalmo- scope and hypodermic syringe which he brought from Wies, the maker, in London. He entered soon upon a large and lucrative practice, mainly in the line of his specialty, notwithstanding specialties were not then in favor with the profession. June 8th, 1864, he was elected, at a meeting in New York, an active member of the American Ophthal- mological Society, which has labored, from the beginning, to elevate the standard and cultivate ophthalmology in America, then but recently so brilliantly and successfully ushered in, in Europe, by the combined labors of Von Baer, Von Jager, Von Graefe, Arlt, Helmholtz, in Germany; Donders, in Holland; Sichel, Desmarres, in France, and Mackenzie, Crichett and Bowman in England, and which is now ele- vated to one of the most exact and scientific departments of the medical sciences. He may, therefore, not inappropriately, be called the pio- neer ophthalmologist of the northwest, permanently settled in Detroit. Dr. E. Williams, of Cincinnati, it is true, preceded him two years in his visit and study in Europe, and was, it must be conceded, at the time he commenced practice in Cincinnati, in 1855, the pioneer classical opthal- mologist west of the Alleghany mountains.
In 1873 he was appointed professor of ophthalmology and otology in the Detroit Medical College and ophthalmic and surgeon to the St. Mary's, Harper and Woman's Hospitals, and held those positions some ten years. In 1876 he was appointed United States Pension Surgeon and held this position till I$84. He was also medical examiner for the
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Connecticut Mutual Life and New York Mutual Life Associations. At the meeting of the American Medical Association, at Newport, R. I., in 1889, he was appointed representative of the association, duly accred- ited, to the British Medical Association and similar bodies in Europe for one year.
He was an important witness in the malpractice suit at Kalama- zoo, and gave unwilling expert testimony in the case exacted by the court. The case was prosecuted by one Robert Burget, employed on the railroad, whose hip was dislocated August 27th, 1873, while coup- ling cars, which, after it had been unreduced more than six weeks, he had the good fortune to reduce by manipulation (Reed's method) after it had been manipulated and worked on with the tripod and pulley by half a dozen skilled surgeons.
This case gave rise to a good deal of hard feeling between the physicians of Kalamazoo and Detroit, who had taken part in the treat- ment and management of the case, in efforts to shirk or shift responsi- bility from one side to the other. This would not have appeared here had not one of the defendants (Dr. Hitchcock) put in print an entirely garbled and one-sided review of the whole case.
Dr. Noyes is an active member of the following societies : American Medical Association, American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Ophthalmological and Otological Societies, Michi- gan State Medical Society, Detroit Academy of Medicine, of which he was president in 1873, Detroit Medical and Library Association, and the Pioneer and Historical Society. He is honorary member of the Ohio, Rhode Island, Maine and Texas State Medical Associations.
He is author of numerous contributions to medical literature. His life work has been devoted to his profession and his calling has bounded his ambition.
For sanitary reasons, and (as he believes) in the interest of humanity, he is strongly in favor of incineration of the dead for burial, and upon the organization of the Michigan Cremation Association March 31st, 1886, he was made its first president. He is unmarried.
For the past two years Dr. Noyes has found that hard study, and the arduous duties imposed by his profession, were making such inroads upon his health as to demand some relaxation, and he has therefore retired from active practice, and has spent the time in traveling.
His temporary absence from Detroit leaves a vacuum which is felt by many. The hope is that he may return with health restored, and be able to resume his practice.
His education and numerous exalted positions filled by him in the line of his profession, furnish the evidence of his scientific ability, and needs no additional comment by the memorialist.
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He is kind, genial, full of sympathy for the suffering and unfortu- nate; practices no deception with his patients, is frank to give his opinion, does not seek to excite hopes which he believes are delusive, is firm in his convictions of what is just and true, and independent in their maintenance.
COLIN CAMPBELL.
Colin Campbell was born in Scotland 1811, came to Detroit at an early age, established the house known for thirty years as that of Campbell & Linn, and during that period was considered one of the principal business men of the city. He was actively engaged in Detroit for over thirty-eight years. The last years of his life he con- fined himself to insurance and real estate.
LYMAN COCHRANE.
Judge Lyman Cochrane was the only son of the Rev. Sylvester Cochrane, clergyman of the Congregational faith, and was born in the State of New Hampshire, August 6, 1825. He accompanied his parents on their removal to Michigan in 1837, and in 1844 became a permanent resident of Detroit.
His early education and preparation for college was had chiefly under the supervision of his father and mother. He entered the Michigan University at Ann Arbor, graduating therefrom in the class of 1849. He had as associates and classmates, T. R. Chase, Hon. J. Logan Chipman, the late Hon. Dwight May, of Kalamazoo, Dr. Edward Andrews, of Chicago, Hon. O. M. Barnes, of Lansing, William A. Moore and Hon. Thomas W. Palmer, of Detroit. He began the study of law in the office of Messrs. H. H. Wells and William A. Cook. After attending the Ballston Law School in the State of New York, on his return to Detroit, he entered the office of Messrs. Howard & Toms. In 1862, he associated himself with the late William Gray. This relation continued but a short time, owing to the death of Mr. Gray, and he then opened an office on his own account, confining his practice to that branch requiring the preparation of bills in Chancery, and as the counsellor and adviser of the younger members of the bar, who relied more on his judgment and knowledge than upon their own.
He was recognized by the entire members of the Detroit bar as a profound lawyer, and enjoyed their confidence and respect to an eminent degree.
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In the fall of 1870 Mr. Cochrane was elected a member of the Legislature, and in 1873 was chosen Judge of the Superior Court of Detroit, and was on the eve of a re-election when death intervened to deprive the city and its citizens of a just and upright judge, the mem- bers of the legal profession of an accomplished jurist, and his personal acquaintances of a friend whose fidelity and integrity of character was never questioned.
Judge Lyman Cochrane, died at his house on Winder street, Detroit, February 5, 1879, leaving an only sister, Miss Sarah Cochrane, whose whole life was devoted to her only brother. She was the one he relied upon for sympathy when in trouble, for advice when in doubt, and encouragement when despondent. Miss Cochrane is now occupied at the Detroit Public Library.
DR. WILLIAM BRODIE.
Bishop King says: "The bed of a sick man is a school, a doctoral chair of learning and discipline."
Dr. William Brodie, of Detroit, if practical experience is a pre- requisite, is now entitled to the degree which Dryden defines as "doctoral" and which Bishop King employs in the above quotation; at least it would appear, from the following facts, that if he has not already received it, the evidence of his medical brethren and the general public have awarded it him.
Doctor Brodie was born July 28th, 1823, at Buckinghamshire, Eng. His name would indicate that his paternal ancestor was of Highland Scotch descent. The Clan Brodie was an ancient one, judg- ing from the tartan which the Doctor has in possession. His father was at some time prior to his emigration to the United States, horticulturist to the Fawley estate. His father first settled near Rochester, N. Y., where the Doctor pursued his studies under the tuition of his father. At the age of twenty-one he entered the collegiate institute of Brock- port, N. Y. After completing a literary course he came to Pontiac, Mich., in 1847, and became a student of Dr. Wm. Wilson, one of the most celebrated in the State as a medical practitioner. . He also spent some time in Woodstock, Vt., and Pittsfield, Mass., attending lectures, and entered the College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York City, in 1849, graduated in 1850, and commenced practice in Detroit in 1850. From 1850 to 1861 was surgeon to St. Mary's Hospital and St. George's and St. Andrew's Societies, was at different times vice-presi- dent and secretary of the American Medical Association, and its president in 1886, for three years editor of the Peninsular Journal of Medicine and Surgery, and editor of the Therapeutic Gazette for four
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years. As a member of the Audubon Society, he has been active in securing the enactment of laws for the protection of game and was its president.
He was surgeon of the First Regiment of Michigan Volunteers three months in 1861 and was subsequently appointed brigade surgeon by President Lincoln; has been alderman from his ward and president of the Common Council and of the Board of Health and was one of the first members of the Detroit Medical Society, and president also of the Wayne County Society for four years. In 1876 he attended, as a delegate, the International Medical Congress at Philadelphia, and was first vice-president of the Ninth International Medical Congress held in Washington in 1887. The many prominent positions held by him is the evidence of the estimate which the medical fraternity hold, as to his professional worth, and ability, and by the Masonic fraternity he has been recognized as a Mason of good repute throughout the State, and is the oldest Past Master of Zion Lodge.
In November, IS51, he married Miss Jane Whitfield, daughter of James Whitfield, of Monk Sherbourn, England. They have two sons and one daughter. The youngest son is at present practicing with his father. The Doctor at this time is surgeon in chief of the Chicago and Grand Trunk railway, also of the western division of the Grand Trunk system, member of the Board of Health, and now its president, mem- ber of the Board of Examiners of Pensions for Wayne county, of which he is its treasurer.
JUDGE H. B. BROWN.
The paternal ancestor of the subject of this sketch emigrated from England, and settled first in the Province of Massachusetts, in the latter part of the sixteenth century, but prior to the war of Independence removed to the Colony of Connecticut and settled in New London county.
Judge Henry Billings Brown was born at Lee, Mass., March 2d, 1836. He was the son of Billings Brown, who was largely engaged in manufacturing in that town. His mother must have been a woman of Christian culture and refinement, as the Judge has said "he received his first impressions of religious duty " and acquired his taste for liter- ature and the fine arts from his mother.
After previous preparation he entered Yale College, grad- uating therefrom in 1856. He then spent a year in Europe, and on his return began the study of law and completed his course, at the Yale and Harvard Law Schools. On leaving Cambridge he entered the office of Messrs. Walker & Russell in Detroit, and was admitted to the bar in 1860.
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In 1861 he was appointed the legal deputy of the late Col. Chas. Dickey, United States Marshal for the District of Michigan. Serving two years in this capacity, he was appointed Assistant United States District Attorney for Michigan. At the end of four years he resigned this position and entered into general practice, making that of admiralty a specialty. The Hon. Chas. I. Walker, having meantime resigned the judgeship of Wayne Circuit, Governor Crapo appointed Judge Brown to succeed him. At the close of his term of office as Circuit Judge of Wayne, he resumed his practice in connection with Messrs. Newberry & Pond, until appointed by President Grant, United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Michigan in 1875.
He brought to this position a logical mind carefully trained by close study and the practical experience acquired in his long service as a law officer of the general government, and was thus prepared for the duties pertaining to it, evincing such ability that one of the present Justices of the United States Supreme Court has said in respect to his decisions in admiralty cases: "They need no review by this Court as to the proper application of the provisions of law."
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