USA > New Hampshire > Grafton County > Littleton > History of Littleton, New Hampshire, Vol. II > Part 10
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LITTLETON NATIONAL BANK AND LITTLETON SAVINGS BANK - INTERIOR.
87
Banks and Bankers.
lature was appointed chairman of the committee on banks. In 1898 he represented this district in the State Senate, where he served on the important committees on banking, revision of laws, and railroads. He was also a member of Governor Rollins's staff, with the rank of Colonel. This military-political position is esteemed one of the desirable prizes awarded by the incumbent of the gubernatorial chair.
Mr. Hatch is a zealous member of the Masonic fraternity and has attained its highest degree. His record in the fraternity follows : Received the degrees in Burns Lodge of A. F. and A. Masons September 1, 1882, and subsequently the degrees in Franklin Chapter of Royal Arch Masons, Omega Council of R. & S. Masons, St. Gerard Commandery ; Knights Templar (was two years Eminent Commander) ; Aaron P. Hughes Lodge of Perfec- tion, Nashua, N. H. A. A. S. Rite ; Washington Council Princes of Jerusalem, A. A. S. Rite (Grand Master five years ) ; Littleton Chapter of Rose Croix, A. A. S. Rite ; Edward A. Raymond Con- sistory, A. A. S. Rite ; and on September 18, 1894, was coronated an Honorary Member of the Supreme Council, 33° for the North- ern Masonic Jurisdiction of the United States of America.
When Jolin Farr began to feel that his comfort was to be promoted by lessening rather than increasing his business cares, he resigned the presidency of the Savings Bank, George A. Bingham succeeding. Judge Bingham remained in the position until within a few weeks of his death in January, 1895, when Charles F. Eastman was chosen, and has continued in the office since. When in 1888 Mr. Farr retired from the head of the National Bank, it was to give place to Oscar C. Hatch. Since their establishment the National Bank has had but two presidents, the Savings Bank but three; while Mr. Hatch has for nearly a generation been the directing genius at the governing board of both institutions.
The workman, whether he labor with mind or hands, impresses the character of his individuality upon the product. All who have known the character, sagacity, and attainments of John Farr, Oscar C. Hatch, George A. Bingham, Charles F. Eastman, and their associates in the direction of the affairs of these banks, will recognize the moral force and financial strength of these men stamped upon these institutions through the growth from small beginnings to their present strength, which rests more in the confidence of the people than in the sums distributed among investors or stored in the vaults of the banks.
88
History of Littleton.
XXX.
THE PROFESSION OF MEDICINE.1
BY ALBERT STILLMAN BATCHELLOR, M.A.
T HE first period of the history of the town as viewed from the medical standpoint might be limited by the date of settlement and the advent of the settled physician, that is to say, from 1700 to 1800. Much of the material which would be valuable and interesting for this theme and which might once have been drawn from that period, is irretrievably lost. The doctor dwelt a long distance apart from his Apthorp patients. He had no time to inform the world of his doings. The newspapers did not report his cures nor advertise his skill. He did not anticipate the duty that would fall upon his remote successors on occasions like this. He failed to hand down a convenient journal of inter- esting dates, experiences, and observations, as a country prac- titioner of the ancient days. Moreover, the science of recorded observations of disease and of medical statistics found small place in the outfit of the custodian of the healing art in that early day in this region. He dealt with the ills of the flesh according to his best skill and judgment, but had neither the opportunity nor the facilities for compiling vital statistics or health reports.
McMaster, in his " History of the People of the United States," has graphically described the doctor of this period, his education, his practice, his medicines. No better view of the subject can be found in the space which he devotes to it. The picture is inter- esting and instructive. It gives us an opportunity for a suggestive comparison of the practice at the extremes of our own centenary, for it is the doctor of 1784 who is described by McMaster.2
1 The profession of medicine was assigned to Dr. C. M. Tuttle, as a subject for his contribution to the Centennial of 1884. He gathered some data, but the address was omitted and subsequently prepared for the volume of published proceedings and credited to the doctor, but as published it was from the pen of Judge Batchellor, who has also brought the chapter down to date.
2 Vol. i. pp. 27-36.
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The Profession of Medicine.
The population was scattered over the river valleys, and was made up of a class that was adventurous and strong. They had no luxuries. If there were any virtue in exercise and ventilation, the human system ought to have come very near perfection in the persons of our pioneer ancestors. They had, of course, the rough life and diet peculiar to new settlements. There was no profit in adulteration of food and rum. Women worked out of doors with the men, and practised no black art to cut off posterity. We have, in the case of Hannah Caswell, whose story has been so well related by Dr. Rankin,1 an illustration of the stamina of the women of that time. The people of that generation had a mission to perform, and nature, at the same time generous and discrimi- nating, had given them physical capabilities equal to all the burdens that were thrust upon them. No doubt they defied many of the maxims of health which we regard as fundamental. Consumption assailed individuals who failed to inherit the average vital power of the race, and fevers brought down the strong in their strength. Disorders of the latter class were generated, in some instances, from the decay of vegetable matter which precedes the abolition of swamps and follows the clearing up of the new land; and in other cases in neglect of sanitary conditions, in the location and care of stables, out-buildings, and places of retirement, and imperfect drainage ; in the non-exclusion of filth from milk and other food, and recklessness in exposure to the rigors and vicissitudes peculiar to the climate. The inevitable results of these conditions followed ; but the fatal diseases were generally of simple diagnosis, and belonged to a very few classes, as compared with the complex catalogue of physical disorders with which the medical profession has to do in the same locality at the present time.
In the first ten years the population had not reached a score; in 1790 it is given as 96, and in 1800 it was 381. The dearth of interesting data for an account of the relations of such a popu- lation to the subject of medicine is not due solely to the remote- ness of the time. Towns about us equally isolated in location and sparsely populated would not to-day yield very much more material for the purposes of medical history than the Littleton which antedated the days of its first settled physician.
We know something of the early practitioners who came with their saddle-bags at infrequent intervals through the town. We know their modes of practice and we have their books of account, showing what the hardy settlers had to take and what they had
1 Littleton Centennial, p. 21.
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History of Littleton.
to pay. We know that, owing to the skill of the doctors to cure or the stamina of the people in resisting the effects of disease and per- haps of medicine, they increased, multiplied, and were strong. We know that no deadly epidemics scourged the populace, and that they were blessed with health to a degree that is remarkable.
The good old mothers knew the simplest and best of nature's restoratives, and every garret was an honest and reliable deposi- tory of the pharmacy of the field and forest.
Patent medicines and the nostrum tramps who announce their coming in the gorgeous rhetoric of the circus bills are now the humbug substitutes for the wholesome regimen of health, which, in the absence of professional advice, the good housewives of old prescribed, without money and without price, for the healing of the people. If the doctor could not be called or was not wanted, the old matrons gave doses from substances whose properties were understood, and gave them in accordance with the teachings of authentic experience. The good sense of the people in this mat- ter is monumental. The times have changed. We read of a nostrum ; somebody has lied about its virtues ; the falsehood is advertised in a thousand papers, on fences and on rocks ; with- out analysis, without knowledge of its constituents, without inquiry as to the skill of its contriver or the character of its sponsor, its consumers are the millions of all classes and con- ditions. The stuff is taken in quantities. that would turn a thousand mills, and craft is made rich out of folly and ignorance. Butler well says in his " Hudibras ": -
" Doubtless the pleasure is as great Of being cheated as to cheat."
There were few medical schools and few medical societies at the time of which I have spoken. The doctors were, as a rule, fairly taught, but by private preceptors. The degree of M.D. was an exceptional distinction. It is difficult, and perhaps im- possible, to name all the regular physicians who rode a circuit through Apthorp and early Littleton. We know that Dr. Samuel White, of Newbury, Vt., and later on, Dr. Isaac Moore, of Bath, were among them. There may have been others, but we do not find their
" Footprints on the sands of time."
Perhaps the purposes of the subject and the occasion may be as well subserved by giving personal sketches of these men and of their successors in the profession, in the order in which they have
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The Profession of Medicine.
entered into the history of the town, and by showing the re- lations of each to medical progress in his day and place of action.
In comparing the accomplishments of the early practitioners with their successors, it should be constantly borne in mind that great advances have been made in the methods and appliances of medical science since 1770. This is not the occasion for a careful review of this progress, but we may note hereafter some of its more prominent features.
It fortunately happened that all mention of Dr. Samuel White, the first settled physician in the Coos Country, so called, was omitted in Miss Hemmenway's " Gazetteer of Vermont." I speak of the incident as fortunate, for it called out a very full biographical account of Dr. White from his friend Dr. W. H. Carter, who was formerly also located at Newbury, but was then living at a great age at Bradford. Dr. Carter was eminently qualified for this duty, as he had from his boyhood known Dr. White, and during the last twenty years of the latter's life was intimately acquainted with him. The lives of these two men cover a long space, and include the whole period of the civilized history of the region in which they practised their profession. I shall adopt all of Dr, Carter's article that is material to my subject ; one item should be added, - Dr. White had a large family of children, in which twins were a not infrequent occurrence.
Dr. Carter says :-
" Dr. Samuel White was born in Plaistow, State of New Hampshire, November 10, 1750. He was the son of Nicholas White, Esq., a re- spectable farmer of that town. He received his early education at the common school where he lived; and he also obtained a competent knowledge of the Latin language to enter upon the study of medicine with facility. At the early age of seventeen he commenced his medi- cal studies, and continued them four years, under the instruction of Thomas Brickett, M.D., of Haverhill, Mass., who was a man of learn- ing and skill, having enjoyed the advantages of the medical schools and hospitals of Edinburgh, in Scotland, and served as surgeon in the British army. The long term of study, under the instruction of an eminent physician and surgeon, was well calculated to fasten in his mind that knowledge which was afterward so much needed by him when, far removed from his professional brethren and in a new country, he was forced to rely upon his own knowledge and judgment in many difficult cases committed to his charge.
" At the expiration of his pupilage Dr. White was well recommended by his preceptor, and entered upon the duties of his profession. He practised one or two years in his native town with good acceptance in
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History of Littleton.
families of the best respectability. But at that time the tide of emi- gration was fast setting to the north. Many families and individuals from the southern portion of New Hampshire and from Massachusetts had located themselves upon the fertile meadows of the Coos Country. Noah White, an elder brother of the doctor, had removed to Newbury with his family in 1763; and Col. Jacob Kent, who married his sister, Mary White, emigrated with his family the same year. Some years after this Samuel visited his brother and sister at the 'Coos,' and carried with him a proclamation for a day of Thanksgiving, which had been duly observed where he resided, but was received and used by Rev. Peter Powers and his parishioners, as related in the 'Early History of Coos.' In the spring of 1773 Dr. White concluded to try his fortune with the new settlers on the hills and valleys of the wilder- ness. This, it will be perceived, was ten years after the first settle- ment of Newbury was begun, and two years before the Revolutionary War. At that time there were some families in Newbury, Haverhill, Bradford, Orford, and Piermont, and it was necessary that a physician should be located among them. Nor was there any physician between Newbury and Canada on the river, so that Dr. White was the only one to be called upon for a considerable distance round, at the first com- mencement of his practice. He was sometimes called to the distance of many miles through dense forests to visit the sick; and these ex- cursions were sometimes performed on foot and on snow-shoes, while marked trees were the only guide that led him to his destination. The writer of this has heard Dr. White relate many stories of his nocturnal rambles to visit his patients, when the darkness was so great that he was obliged to feel for a path to avoid wandering into a swamp or falling headlong from some abrupt precipice.
" Roads and bridges were but few ; rapid streams were to be forded and quagmires to be passed through ; while the howl of a wolf or the growl of a bear were the only evidence given him that the woods were inhabited. The doctor would often tell of the uncomfortable situation in which he found his patients ; many of them in log houses without chim- neys, while the only redeeming chance that they had to be warm was to fill the fireplace with wood, of which they had a plenty. He said he had seen little drifts of snow where the new-born infant was lying with its mother. On one or two occasions the doctor travelled on snow- shoes to Lancaster, N. H., to visit some families settled there, while the log huts on the way were few and far between. Most of the in- habitants at that time were able to pay him but little for his services ; but there was one thing, he said, to cheer him, - they were always glad to see him. At the time of the Revolutionary War Dr. White had fully entered upon the duties of his profession at his new home. With the new settlers, generally, he was well acquainted, and he had his patients in turn among them all. And whether they were active patri- ots in the American cause or favored the idea of submission to British
93
The Profession of Medicine.
rule, he still pursued the even tenor of his way, seeking their best good as their physician. He was ready at all times to serve his country in his professional capacity, as occasion required. He acted as surgeon to the Continental soldiers who were stationed at Newbury, under the command of Gen. Jacob Bayley, and dressed the wound received by a Mr. Gates, when a scout of British and Tories made a foray upon the people at the Oxbow, in quest of General Bayley. When General Burgoyne entered the western part of Vermont, Dr. White attended, as surgeon, such troops as could be spared from Newbury and the vicinity, to arrest the march of the British army, and remained with them until their return from the field of victory. Dr. White was con- sidered a good physician by his employers generally ; and the writer of this remembers of hearing several of his cotemporaries speak in high praise of his success in some very serious diseases ; and he continued to sustain the reputation of a judicious and skilful practitioner, as the country became more settled. In the various epidemics which appeared at different times, he manifested a good degree of professional knowl- edge, and evinced a tact and judgment adapted to the embarrassing and uncomfortable situation in which he frequently found his patients. In the treatment of chronic diseases the powers of his judgment and discerning were conspicuously displayed, and he always adhered to a regular and scientific course, founded upon true principles of Pathology as developed in his time. In his intercourse with his professional brethren, Dr. White was quite communicative, and liberally contrib- uted from the stores of knowledge which a long experience had enabled him to lay up. Hence he was often consulted with confidence by his juniors, after age and infirmities rendered it necessary for him to relinquish in a great measure the regular care of patients. As an operative surgeon Dr. White never made any pretension to fame, although at different periods of his practice he performed several of the minor operations with success. He was of a calm and easy dis- position, benevolence greatly predominating, so that he might truly be said to
' Lay his own advantage by To seek his neighbor's good.'
"He was not a close collector of debts due to him, and a great part of his earnings were never paid. In his daily intercourse with his em- ployers, Dr. White was of a cheery and facetious turn of mind, and, where danger was not apprehended, his funny remarks and capital stories would often act as a cordial in cases where there was a de- pression of the mind from extreme 'nervousness' or an unfounded apprehension of danger. He had a peculiar way of relating his anec- dotes and short stories, well calculated to diffuse a spirit of mirth and pleasantry among his audience, and cause them for a time to forget their troubles. Many of his capital stories will long be remembered
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History of Littleton.
and rehearsed; but his manner of telling them cannot be fully imitated.1
" About four years previous to his death Dr. White united with the First Congregational Church in Newbury. But the sun of his life was fast declining, and his mind and memory soon exhibited but a wreck of what it had once been. The powers of life gradually receded from the worn-out body, and on the twenty-sixth day of February, 1847, he quietly fell asleep, aged ninety-seven years."
The worn and time-stained account books of Dr. White pre- sent to us a most interesting view of the practice of a country doctor rather more than a hundred years ago.
Two books, of some three hundred and sixty manuscript pages, which seem to have dated from the beginning of his Newbury practice, are preserved. In them are the itemized accounts, written in a hand like copperplate, of the journeys he took, the drugs he exhibited, the teeth he pulled, and the sums he charged but often did not collect. There are entries from 1773 to 1790, not always chronologically arranged, and probably not covering the whole of his practice during that period, but presenting doubtless a good average specimen.
He visited in Corinth, Bath, Mooretown,2 Haverhill, Barnet, Upper Coos, Piermont, Lyman, Peacham, Ryegate, Topsham, Gun- thwaite,8 Landaff, Morristown,4 Apthorp,5 Wentworth, Coventry,6 Rumney, Groton, Bradford, Riverlamoile,7 and Newbury.
The visit and each item of treatment were accounted sepa- rately. For instance, we find, at the last of a series of visits to Mr. Abial Chamberlain, the charge made as follows : "Sept. 10th, 1784. To visit 2s. Physic 1s. Emet. 1s. Bleeding 1s. Sal. Nitre 1s. - 6s." The minimum charge for a visit was one shilling ; the maximum was sixty shillings - to Upper Coos. While there was usually a regular schedule of charges, there are occasionally great variations, for reasons which do not appear, but the weather and the difficulty of the journey and the urgency of the call were doubtless taken into consideration ; and a very low price may have arisen from other visits to the same place, as well as from the poverty of the patient. To Corinth it was all the way from one to twenty shillings ; to Haverhill, two to six; to Apthorp, two, three, and twenty-seven shillings.
Medicine was usually one shilling, sometimes two; bleeding,
1 It was Dr. White who remarked that he always had poor luck with his patients in their last sickness.
Now Bradford, Vt.
3 Now Lisbon.
Franconia.
5 Littleton.
6 Benton.
7 A location not ascertained.
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The Profession of Medicine.
always one shilling; tooth pulling, one shilling ; dressing a wound, one shilling; lancing a sore, one shilling ; setting an arm or leg, six shillings. " Attendance on your wife's Travel" was twelve shillings. The dollar, it appears, was equal to six of the twenty shillings which make a pound, as we find a credit of seven dollars on account, entered as £2 2s., or 42s. These two books show accounts approximating £2,500 ; a large proportion of them have no credit entries, and probably were not paid, as he seems to have entered carefully all payments. Many a large account ran six, eight, or ten years, and when settlement is made, it is more fre- quently by note of hand than by cash.
The good doctor used a wide range in his materia medica. One hundred and fifty-two remedial agents are mentioned in his books; thirty-six of these are used once only, ten twice, and eleven three times. When his patients wanted medicine, they had it. In 4,271 recorded visits only 181 were plain; in all the others something happened, and as we have a record of 8,471 doses or operations, frequently much took place.
His main reliance was upon comparatively few remedies. It was -
" Physic " (some efficient mixture of his own) 1,630 times
Camphor
994
Valerian
650
Bleeding .
504
Cream Tartar
444 66
4,222
He gave -
228 " vomits" (or " emetic "). 288 doses of cortex, or balsam Peru.
275 66 myrrh.
258
rhubarb.
244
bitters.
262 tartar emetic.
203
nitre.
148 66 antimony, crude or wine.
137
lavender.
116
" contraery " (contraerva).
93
calomel.
83
assafœtida.
81
chamomile.
2,416
2,416
6,638
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History of Littleton.
He used guiacum, jalap, magnesia, castor, scilla, and sapo pills more than fifty times each ; and paregoric twenty-one ; liq. laud. twenty ; cascarilla, gum Arabic, oil of amber, elixir vitriol, elixir salutis, annis seed, gum ammoniac, cinnamon, licorice, pectoral balsam, Armenia Bole, and sweet spirits of nitre, twenty or more times each.
He used pill cochiæ, pill athiops, pill cathartic, sapo pills, female pills, mercurial pills, Hooper's, Anderson's and Locker's pills ; elixirs vitriol, asuna, solutis, proprieta, stomatica ; Bate- man's and Thurlington's drops, and British oil.
Most of these drugs are found or known in every pharmacy to-day. British oil, Bateman's drops, Thurlington's drops, and Hooper's pills greet us with their marvellous cures of over a century upon their imitation antique wrappers.
Less familiar are these others of Dr. White's medicines : sago permeum, sp. sal c. c., ens veneris, Roman vitriol, flos bolostinos, lac ammoniac, mellilot, cinnabar, " contraery," sal mirabile, oculi crancorum, sp. hierapic., flos benjamin, crocus, vorsena, sal cor cerebrini, winter bark and hat case.
One misses from the list many potent chemicals and chemical groups. lodides and bromides would not be expected. Opiates are little used; alcohols were probably kept in the house, or easily got at the store ; aids to digestion appear but little. The remedies apply to inflammatory diseases largely and to a rugged people. Dr. White bled, in his record, five hundred and four times at a shilling each - about a hogshead all told. He seems to attend to it periodically, as we find entries in different house- holds at the same date. Many a time we find " To bleeding two," and not infrequently " To bleeding three."
His surgical practice seems not to have been large. In the records he has account of seventy-six tooth pullings only, dress- ing wounds fifty-seven times, - often several times in the same case, - setting ten arms and three legs. He records only seven confinements, a number so small that it is difficult to find satis- factory explanation.
I am indebted to Dr. E. J. Bartlett, of Dartmouth College, for this excellent analysis of the old books of account. On the point raised by Dr. Bartlett as to the reason for the limited practice in obstetrics indicated by the charges, I have little doubt that the explanation lies in the fact that there were numerous expert mid- wives in the new settlements, and they attended to this class of cases. It would be on exceptional occasions that Dr. White, the only physician in the country, could be accessible to such calls.
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