USA > New Hampshire > Hillsborough County > Nashua > History of the city of Nashua, N.H. > Part 38
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Thus the people were forced to be self-reliant, hence their sturdiness and energy. So also with the physician ; he could not have within his reach the recent medical lectures of a large number of professors ; no skilled druggist at his command to prepare his compounds, and render the bitter sweet ; no warm sleigh, covered with costly furs in which to make his calls. Far different. The country doctor was obliged to be his own pharmacist and dispenser of pills and herbs, and the small amount of literature which it was his good fortune to obtain, was more after the form of a treatise than a live and recent lecture or essay.
He carried his few simples in bags made for the purpose and thrown over the saddle, and, astride his good horse, made his professional calls, often, in the winter, through enormous drifts of snow, and almost trackless and lonely forest roads so dense and dark as that only the good beast himself could with great difficulty pick the way. Then, too, there was no friendly brother doctor near, upon whom he could call in cases of emergency, but he was obliged to be a tower of strength unto himself, and right nobly, so far as we may learn, has he met the full requirements demanded.
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His purpose in life seems never to have changed, or to have differed one whit from that of physicians of to-day. He labored with greater disadvantages and more hardships for the same end, signalling, with blazing ensign, the fact of his willingness to do good unto all and at all times. His indomitable pluck and untiring energy to allay disease can well be a lesson to the recent graduate, and serve to renew his faltering, failing strength for the battle of the future.
The medicines of these pioneer physicians were few, and for the most part, simple. The more important drugs consisted of opium, iron, and the various barks and roots, both foreign and domestic in their growth, but the value of each, owing to their smallness in number, was all the more thoroughly understood and appreciated. The herbs and remedies from the vegetable world far exceeded those from the mineral kingdom. Their doses were quite sufficient, as many now living can affirm from experience, and their reasons for the exhibition of this or that drug, if not able to be made plain to the modern physician, were in most cases, quite as successful in accomplishing the desired results.
Blood-letting was considered in those days to be of the utmost value and importance, if not an absolute necessity, and there was scarcely a disease which did not demand it.
The various parts of the body were reckoned to be of the greatest importance in regard to the abstraction of blood from it. Those troubles which affected the heart, head and chest, together with the various forms of neuralgia and rheumatism, were cases in which bleeding was supposed to be most efficacious.
We must remember that, in those times, the effort to live and grow up was so great that only the strongest and most healthy children were equal to the attaining of manhood's age.
Then, too, the natural health of the people was such that there were fewer feeble children born into the world. Their out-door life and simple nourishment, together with the enforced labor and well ventilated abodes, prevented many of our most common diseases from occurring. Thus the physician was perhaps able to do with less drugs and fewer remedies and, possibly, less learning without necessarily increasing the death rate. Indeed, we find that they did not all have the honor of graduating from schools of medicine, but, with minds naturally gifted with great observation, penetration and almost perfect retentive power, they managed each year to become more skilled and efficient in their chosen work.
Their book-learning, in the majority of cases, was limited, more especially to materia medica, therapeutics, and clinical medicine, and added to these, they were expected to know something of surgery. They were the dentists of the place and performed that part of their duties by extracting all offending members, and, perhaps, if very skillful, replacing, after the loss of all, by false ones, those which to-day would have been considered unjustly sacrificed.
Then, too, the country doctor was the only veterinary surgeon, and did not deem it at all beneath his dignity to render aid to his brother's ox, cow, or horse, if, perchance, his services were so needed.
As we all know the times were very hard, and ready money scarce; the inhabitants poor, unlettered and likewise few in number. The old New England climate was cold, rigorous and severe in the winter season, and equally as hot and uncomfortable during the summer months, so that, were it not for the natural inborn love and devotion to his work, there would have been fewer followers of the medical profession than were found. When we consider the enforced long rides, and the exposure to all kinds of weather and at all times during the twenty-four hours, and the smallness of the remuneration received, it is a wonder that we could have found any physicians in Nashua prior to the year 1820. Indeed, they as often did receive their recompense in the shape of table produce or cattle fodder as in any other form of payment.
They appreciated their neighbor's wants, yes, and even anticipated them to the most self- sacrificing degree, and their rough, even uncouth exterior most often hid the warmest kind of an inner self. It is said that they were obliged to procure their medicines from distant Boston town, a journey of more than forty miles, as the roads then run. The doctor would start at day-break, even before the rising of the sun, mounted on his faithful steed, and travel slowly through the little hamlets along the various streams, stopping here and there at those grand old warm-hearted hostelries, for which the country was then famous, and picking up now and then the general news and various gossips to be retailed when he should again reach home.
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Arriving in town he would lay in a six months' supply, carefully and discreetly selected, not only as to kind and quality, but also as to quantity, so as to be within the limits of his slender purse, and, having satisfied himself in these respects, retire to the chop house, there to discuss the living questions of the day.
It is also related that the doctor was likewise called upon during these trips to make purchases for friends and patients, and became, as it were, an express messenger for his neighbors. This was before the regular run made by the stage coaches which afterwards very effectually transacted all such business up to the time of the coming of the canals and railroads.
The physician then was much nearer the hearts and homes of his little flock than now, being, from necessity, as often called upon to administer to their moral and mental ails as to those of a purely physical nature. The want and need of mutual trust and confidence has in no age been better exemplified than during those troubled years in which our forefathers were obliged to guard not only themselves but their fellow-townsmen and their homes as well. Thus, by intimate and close relationship, the physician became even as the patriarch of his tribe, and, in most cases, well deserved the honor.
These little trips to Boston were not altogether distasteful to the doctor himself. He had now an opportunity to visit his brother practitioners and observe their methods, also to call at the few hospitals which then existed, and gather to himself the various innovations in which such places always abound. In this way he materially broadened his pathway in life's work and added to his scanty medical knowledge not a few new ideas, both of a medical and, more especially, of a surgical nature.
Refreshed within and without, and having fulfilled all the trusts which were imparted to him, he again retraced his weary way homeward, where, for some weeks, he was the hero of the place and was expected, and willing, if not anxious, to repeat all the gossip and news he had so carefully treasured for this very purpose. And there was a sense of solid, supreme comfort even to these pioneer physicians, not unmingled with virtuous pride, to be considered the first man in the village.
By the foregoing description we have tried to faithfully portray the pioneer physician of Nashua, covering all that time of which no authentic record can be had as to this or that especial one, even up to the year 1800. Since then we have the medical history fairly well recorded, in memory at least, if not in manuscript. Let us remember, then, that it was from men like these our good common-sensed physicians of to-day have had their origin, and it is due to their honesty and integrity, in great part at least, that we have become what we are.
The first authentic record of any special practitioner we find to be of a certain Dr. Nathan Cutler, of whom it is said that he was the only physician in town during the Revolutionary War and for many years previous. Little more can be learned concerning this good man except that he was after the type of all who resided in Nashua at that time, and that he devoted himself faithfully and successfully to his practice. He died in Nashua and was interred in the old burying ground at the south part of the town. After the war, when the people became more settled and numerous, there came a Dr. Ebenezer Starr, who moved into the place from Dedham. Doctor Starr married Hannah, daughter of Jos. Blanchard. He resided and practiced his profession in Nashua until his death in 1798, aged 52 years. After the father came the son, Dr. Augustus Starr, who married the daughter of Jonathan Blanchard. Dr. Augustus Starr practiced in and about Nashua for several years, but we have not been able to trace his subsequent career, or whether or no he died or was interred in this place.
There is some discrepancy in the various historical statements found concerning the next physician who settled in the town. History tells us that a certain Doctor Maynard resided and practiced here in the year 1803, but we also know that three years previous to that, Dr. Peter Howe and Dr. Micah Eldredge also came to town. Whether Doctor Maynard preceeded the other two or not is not certain, but it is presumable that he did. All that can be learned about him is that during the years 1803 and 1804 he occupied, as office and home, the old "Tontine " building and that soon afterward he moved to Boston where he resided till death.
Dr. Peter Howe lived here considerably longer, coming in the year 1800 or 1803 end staying until 1837 or 1838. Dr. Edward Spalding, who is, at the present writing, living and enjoying the
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best of health and vigor of sturdy manhood, recalls distinctly that, on his coming to this place to reside permanently in the year 1837, Dr. Peter Howe was then a resident in the full practice of medicine and surgery, but that he soon after removed to another part of the country. Doctors Maynard and Howe were of the old type physicians, dispensing their medicines either in saddle bags from horseback or else using the good old two-wheel gig, which became for a while almost synonymous with the name physician. This same two-wheel gig, which, unfortunately, had the knack of tipping suddenly backward should one get into it before the shafts were firmly fastened to the lugs, was a sort of a connecting link between the horse's back and the more commodious four-wheel carriage of to-day.
The nature of the roads and highways perhaps necessitated a vehicle of this sort to be used, so convenient was it to make a short turn in a narrow road and so comparatively easy in gliding over the rough condition of the same, to say nothing of the new and almost untravelled roads and fields. At any rate, they were very generally used by the physicians, some covered and some open, but all rather narrow and supplied with a generous leather boot for shelter from the rain.
From 1800 until the year 1830 there were three very prominent men and citizens settled in Nashua in the practice of the medical profession ; and they were the only ones during that period, so far as can be learned, that resided here for any considerable time. These were Dr. Micah Eldredge coming to the town in 1799 or 1800; Dr. Ebenezer Dearborn in the year 1816 and immediately commenced practicing although he did not receive his diploma as M. D. until 1821; and Dr. Elijah Col- burn in the year 1826, coming here from Hudson, where he had previously practiced two or three years. Of all three it may be justly said "they builded their houses on a rock and the storms and tempests of the succeeding years of their lives were never able to shake the foundation thereof." All three were well learned and thoroughly understood their profession in the practice of physic, yet they differed radically one from another both in general characteristics and mental peculiarities, as well as in physical make-up.
Dr. Micah Eldredge was of large frame and bone, rough and very sturdy in build, heavy, generous limbs and features, very dark in complexion but possessing the most kindly eyes and mouth, as well as the gentlest of dispositions and a most magnanimous heart. A man having a large prac- tice, he studied each case clinically far more carefully than it could have been possible for him to have done by books or other reading. He lived in and for his patients, always ready to respond to a sick call of whatever nature it might chance to be and never shirking a duty either from fear or fatigue. He always did his best and was always ready to try. His good nature was proverbial, and he often compared himself to the dusky skinned race on account of his exceedingly dark complexion.
The following incident is related of him by one of his former patients. This gentleman, when a small lad, became ill with a fever, so very prevalent in those times and the father called in Doctor Eldredge to attend the case. The good doctor, with all the brusqueness of the old times, forbade the use of water except in a very limited degree. It was thought and firmly believed that water, especially cold water, when drunk in large quantities, was quite injurious to one having a fever, they considering that it merely fed the disease and prolonged the case, with an increased amount of heat. Therefore those who were thus afflicted were allowed to suffer the agonies of thirst until each became a veritable Tantalus. Thus the young boy was allowed to suffer day by day, until, in an unguarded moment, the mother or nurse stepping out of the room, he jumped from his stifling, feverish couch, sprang to the well pump and for once drank his fill, consuming, according to his memory, nearly a quart of cold well water. The parents, having discovered this state of affairs, decided that it was best not to inform the doctor of what had occurred, fearing, no doubt, his censure for their supposed care- lessness. Early the next morning, on his arrival, the doctor stepped up quickly to the sick bed, felt the moistened skin, saw the clearing tongue, and observed the brightened appearance and restful condition of his little patient, exclaimed gladly that he was better, and, rubbing his hands gleefully together, in a most cheering voice and manner said, "I knew that last medicine would go to the right spot and see clearly that it has helped the little chick." And, no doubt, the doctor's opinion, from that time on for a considerable period, was that what that particular medicine could not do to allay fever was not worth mentioning.
Doctor Eldredge's influence among the younger practitioners was very marked and they never had a more faithful champion for their up-hill work in getting their first start. He could hardly be
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called a studious man but rather one of great observation and closest scrutiny. After a hard laborious life in the following of his profession for thirty-six years, he retired by reason of his age and infirmities to a much needed rest, and lived until the year 1849, when he passed away grieved for by all with whom he ever came in contact ; a thoroughly good common-sensed doctor and man.
Dr. Ebenezer Dearborn differed from Doctor Eldredge very materially in the matter of studious- ness. He was a student in the strictest sense of the word and possessed all the tastes and inclinations of one. He was a man invaluable as a consulting physician and one whose opinion could hardly be questioned regarding its correctness in any given case. Doctor Dearborn was a great reader and sought the solitude of his study at every opportunity, there to think out and over his cases, striving to be ready for each emergency and to anticipate all complications. He was a small man in build but great in thoughtfulness and kindest in charity. He was very methodical in the matter of dress and disposition and was more than ordinarily particular in personal politeness and carriage. Althuogh he was of rather a retiring disposition and a man of few words, yet he did not keep himself in the background but sought to give his talents to his fellow men, serving the city as alderman and in various other public ways until his death which occurred in 1883.
Doctor Dearborn was generous yet saving and left at his death quite a little real estate and other property to his family.
Dr. Elijah Colburn differed much from either of the two preceding physicians. Not so great a student as Doctor Dearborn, nor yet perhaps so ready to learn from his cases as was Doctor Eldredge, yet he possessed a splendid foundation upon which to build in the matter of education, and spared himself not at all in assiduousness and persistency of application to his practice. He was a determined worker and had all the confidence in himself which is peculiar to one thoroughly understanding his subject. He gathered to himself a large number of patients and friends whose implicit trust and confidence he won and kept. Pecuniarily he received, perhaps, much more assistance from his patients than did either of the two preceding physicians, and the early struggles he was obliged to undergo in order to obtain his education taught him the value of saving all that was possible from his income. Like as to his patients so also with regards to other property of which he chanced to become possessed, it seemed to have the happy faculty of clinging closely to him, and, like his large and varied practice to grow and spread with each succeeding year, until, in his autumn of life, he had amassed quite a fortune.
Like Doctor Dearborn, he was rather short of stature but more robust and full in body. Possessed of perfect health, he was enabled to bear up under the fatiguing work of his life to a remarkable degree, and never seemed to grow weary with his increasing labors. During the latter years of his long life he was assisted much in his practice by his son Edward, who followed in his father's footsteps. Doctor Colburn died in Nashua, Jan. 13, 1881, aged 85 years. To the young well-trained physician of the present day, this older class of men may seem to have had strange notions and crude ideas as to the management of cases coming under their care; but, while we would not decry our present knowledge, nor seek to belittle the same, we would state as an incontestable fact, that the mortality resulting from the efforts of these pioneer physicians has never been proven to be greater than that of those of the present day. They, at least, understood pretty clearly the means at their command, and although the indespensible clinical thermometer was unknown, and the value of the stethoscope and aspirator undiscovered, yet these grand old men were never at loss to diagnosticate very closely the amount of fever present or calculate most carefully as to the conditions of the chest and other large cavities of the body. The modern physician would fare badly indeed should you deprive him of all the little assistants and aids which science has provided for his use. To the efforts and hard labors of these three men the medical history of Nashua even up to the year 1830 is due ; and Nashua has been well blessed in the possession of three such goodly citizens. Considering the hardships of the times in which their early battles were fought and the brilliant results of the closing years of their lives, our best wish is that their memories may always find a warm resting place in the hearts of our people.
About the year 1830 or 1832 there came to Nashua a physician by the name of Chas. P. Coffin, who practiced here for some few years. The most that can be learned concerning him is that he boarded at Mr. Thayer's house and was well liked and fairly successful in his work. He did not remain long however, and moved to some other state about the year 1837.
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Following Doctor Coffin came Dr. J. G. Graves, the senior, in the year 1834. Not a few of the present practicing physicians in our city will remember his jovial self-satisfied appearance and hearty hand-shake. A pre-eminently self-made man and one, who, having to struggle with many adversities during his earlier career, showed keen appreciation of all obstacles and great skill in conquering them. Not only in the line of his profession, but also in business ventures of various kinds did he prove to be very successful and succeeded in putting by quite a competence against the time of his retiring from active work.
Doctor Graves, as with all physicians of those days, had a very large general practice including both of a medical and surgical nature, yet it may justly be said that it was through him that gynecology first received its impulse in our city. Heretofore there had been little or no special work carried on. The hands employed in our mills and other workshops, which began to be operated here about this time, was largely composed of young ladies causing, therefore, a relatively larger proportion of the inhabitants of this class than otherwise would have been. The practitioner, therefore, was naturally more often called upon to treat the diseases peculiar to their sex. Doctor Graves having a particular liking for these cases and a peculiar aptitude for them, they naturally fell into his hands, and in such numbers that he became a veritable expert in handling them. General surgery also held a fascination for him, and, as the workshops increased in number, opportunities were of greater frequency to gain knowledge in this special line.
Doctor Graves retired from active practice in 1877, after more than forty years of hard work, to which he put his whole energy and indomitable force. He died in the year 1889.
Aside from the regular autumnal attacks of the various fevers, which became often epidemic, and the increased number of pneumonia cases during the spring time, there had been up to this time, 1836, no very troublesome diseases to harass or otherwise disturb the peaceful life of our little community.
This state of affairs was rudely changed in the year 1837, and Nashua, for the first time experienced a panic of that much dreaded disease, the small pox.
The first case sprung up in the family of Mr. William Ayers. His house then stood on the site of that now occupied by Mrs. Aaron W. Sawyer next to the City Hall. It seems that a woman from a party of tramps toiling along the dusty roadway stopped at Mrs. Ayers' door to ask for bread and milk for her sick babe, which she carried in her arms. Mrs. Ayers, as was the universal custom in those days, gave the woman immediately what she asked and even more, and her own little son, running to the open doorway, received his death call. Vaccination in those days was not so generally performed, although the protection from it was well known and believed in by most of the educated persons. These tramps undoubtedly being afflicted with the disease, the child in the woman's arms being at that time covered with filthy pustules, left the germs behind and thus, as is sometimes the case, while offering alms in the name of the Lord, and trying to succor and give aid to a hungry and perhaps starving child, her own little one is snatched with cruel force from her breast and made to die from that most loathsome of all diseases, shunned and feared by all, an outcast and a veritable leper to our senses. The existence of this case, which created a most violent panic, was not discovered by the attending physician and was allowed to progress to an unfavorable degree before being rightly diagnosticated. It was only on the decision of Dr. Edward Spalding and father, who were called in to see the case, that it was proven to be small pox, and it was the existence of this case that decided Doctor Spalding to reside here permanently. The story of the panic and the reasons of Doctor Spalding's coming here is best told in his own words.
"After graduating, in 1837, I rode around the country with my father to see practice under him, and it so happened that during that fall there was quite an epidemic of small pox. I took a great deal of interest in it and used to come here with my father to see the patients. There was that fall a case of small pox in the family of Mr. William Ayers of Nashua. The physicians who attended were deceived about it. Some declared it to be chicken pox and others small pox. My father was sent for and I came down with him. We decided it to be small pox. When it was known that it was small pox and there had been one death there was a great panic.
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