History of Westchester county : New York, including Morrisania, Kings Bridge, and West Farms, which have been annexed to New York City, Vol. I, Part 149

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898, ed
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.E. Preston & Co.
Number of Pages: 1354

USA > New York > Westchester County > History of Westchester county : New York, including Morrisania, Kings Bridge, and West Farms, which have been annexed to New York City, Vol. I > Part 149

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Dr. Philander Stewart1 was born in Danbury, Con- nectieut, June 20, 1820, and in 1840 began to study for the profession in Brookfield, the adjoining town. At the medieal institution of Yale College hc at- tended his first course of lectures and graduated at Jefferson College, Philadelphia, in 1844. After two years of practice in Roxbury, Connecticut, he came to Peekskill, and although in three years he had established remunerative professional connections there, he returned to Philadelphia to avail himself of another course of lectures and clinical observations under Prof. Pancoast. Then he resumed his field of labor at Peekskill and eultivated it for upwards of thirty years. In the year 1857 he made a trip to Europe and pursued his investigations for some time in the hospitals and medical schools of the United Kingdom and the Continent. He early attached

himself to the Westchester County Medieal Society, in which he held every office, many of them for suc- cessive terms, and was frequently its delegate to the State Society. For twenty years he was a member of the latter body, making it a point never to be ab- sent from its mcetings. He was also from the begin- ning a member of the American Medical Association, and made long and expensive journeys to meet its annual sessions. As au operating surgeon, for years he was among the first in all the region about him. His manipulations and operations for strangulated hernia were very frequent and successful, as was his management in all eases of diffieult parturition. He performed many amputations. His hand was steady, his instruments many and various, his knives were sharp, his determination almost dogged, his judg- ment good and he was never taken by surprise. In auscultation and percussion he was far above the average, his touch being delieate and his ear acute. If his diagnosis was sometimes shaped too much by his preconceived notion of things, and hence may have missed the mark, it was no more so than is peeu- liar to independent minds. His prognosis was re- markably true ; he had an almost intuitive knowledge of the end from the beginning.

By being thrown from his carriage on May 26, 1869, Dr. Stewart broke an arm aud was stunned by a blow upon the head. Terrible paroxysms of pain in the head attacked him; in October, 1872, he began to lose memory of names and places, his penmanship became entirely changed and he wrote with difficulty. A consultation with Dr. Brown-Sequard on Deeem- ber 3, 1873, resulted in pronouncing his case hopeless. He visited patients the next day, but was at onee prostrated mentally and physically, and after ten weeks of darkness of intellect he died February 11, 1874.

Dr. Havilah Mowry Sprague,2 born at Seotland, Windham County, Conn., July 4, 1835, received his first tuition in medicine in the office of Dr. Hutchins, West Killingly, Conn., and in 1858 became a student under Professor A. C. Post, New York City. He at- tended the New York University Medical College, and received at the close of the session of 1859-60 the first prize for the best report of clinical cases-a post- mortem sct of instruments, whieli were finally used at his own autopsy.

He graduated March 4, 1864, receiving also a " Cer- tificate of Honor " for having pursued a more extend- ed course of study than is required by law. In the competitive examination for the position of " Junior Walker" in the New York Hospital, he passed an examination of superior excellence and was appointed. While herc he passed the United States Army Medi- cal Examining Board, standing No. 2 in general merit out of one hundred and twenty-five candidates exam- ined (it is said that No. 1 was the son of the president

1 Biographical sketch by Dr. James Hart Curry, read before the West- chester County Medical Society at its annual meeting, June 16, 1874.

2 Biography by Dr. Jolin Parsons, King's Bridge.

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HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

of the Examining Board). He was commissioned assistant surgeon United States army May 28, 1861, aud ordered to New Mexico, but upon his arrival in Missouri was attached to the army of General Lyon, was present when he was killed at Spring- field, and subsequently received the thanks of the commanding general for bravery and skill in attend- ance upou the wounded.

Dr. Sprague was transferred to Assistant Surgeon General Wood's office, in St. Louis, where he remained until early in 1863, when he was placed in command of the Eliot General Hospital, in St. Louis. That was shortly discontinued, and he took charge of the hos- pital steamer " City of Memphis," transporting the sick and wounded of Grant's army around Vicksburg to hospitals up the river. During the final days of the siege of Vicksburg he displayed exalted bravery and fidelity in attention to the men torn with shot and shell, sent to his steamer for such aid as the surgeons could render them. In November he was ordered on duty as secretary of the Army Medical Examining Board, in New York City, and then to command of the McDougall General Hospital, at Fort Schuyler, New York Harbor. Thence he was returned to the Examining Board, and in May, 1865, resigued from the army, his name standing high on the list for promotion. He began the practice of medicine at West Farms, and in 1868 moved to Fordham. He was appointed health officer of the town of West Farms, was the first physician to the " Home for Incurables," and first physician to the "House of Rest for Con- sumptives," at Tremont. He was a member of the Westchester County Medical Society, president of the Yonkers Medical Association, was elected a dele- gate to the American Medical Association for 1874 from the latter society, and was preparing to at- tend its meeting at Detroit, Mich., when he was arrested by death ; was a corresponding member of the American Microscopic Society, and member of the New York Pathological Society. He was deeply learned in pathology, and marvelously skilled in the use of the microscope and the preparation of speci- mens. On May 30, 1874, he died at the "House of Rest," where he had been seized with a malarious at- tack during a visit ou the previous day. An autopsy was made, and his brain was found to weigh sixty ounces.

John Foster Jenkins, A.M., M.D., was born at Falmouthı, Mass., April 15, 1826. His preliminary course of medical reading was under Dr. Alexander M. Vedder, at Schenectady, N. Y., and in 1848 he re- ceived his degree from the Medical Department of the University of Pennsylvania. The next year he de- voted to an extra course of didactic and clinical lec- tures at the Harvard Medical School, Boston. From May, 1849, to May, 1856, he practiced in the city of New York (except that from November, 1850, to July, 1851, he was in Europe, employing most of that time at the lectures and clinics and in the hospitals of

Paris). In May, 1856, he located in Yonkers as a general practitioner of medicine, surgery and obstet- rics. In August, 1861, he entered the service of the United States Sanitary Commission as hospital visitor and associate secretary, and in May, 1863, succeeded Frederick Law Olmsted as general secretary, an office which, in May, 1865, he was compelled to resign be- cause of the failure of his health in the performance of its arduous obligations. He renewed his practice in Youkers, and, in 1869, made a second voyage to Europe. On June 21, 1877, he was elected president of the Medical Society of the State of New York, but declined to accept because of his doubt as to the legality of the meeting at which he was chosen. Other offices which he held were as follows: Physi- cian of the St. John's Riverside Hospital, at Yonk- ers ; surgeon of the Yonkers Board of Police ; senior warden of St. Paul's Parish, Yonkers ; president of the Yonkers Medical Association (of which he was one of the founders); president of the Westchester County Medical Society ; vice-president of the New York Obstetrical Society; permanent member of the American Medical Association; member of the Amer- can Public Health Association ; corresponding Fellow of the New York Academy of Medicine; member of the American Social Science Association. In 1878 he spent six months at the sanitary resorts along the Mediterranean for the benefit of his health, and for nearly three years after his return kept steadily at his work. He died October 9, 1882, and, as an expres- sion of the esteem in which he was held, the Yonkers Medical Association, at its uext meeting, unanimously resolved to change its name to the " Jenkins Medical Association."

Dr. Jenkins was a student and an ardent lover of medical literature, both ancient and modern. He collected a large and valuable medical library. His contributions to the literature will be found in the list at the head of this chapter.

Dr. Henry L. Horton was born at Croton, West- chester County, December 6, 1826, and accumulated by manual labor the money which enabled him to enter the Albany Medical College, from where he graduated in 1858, but continued to serve some time afterward as house surgeon. In 1859 he removed to Morrisania and entered upon a large and successful practice. In 1879, and again in 1881, he visited Europe, but his health, which had greatly failed, was only partially restored, and on September 13, 1884, he again sailed. At Florence, Italy, a cold, which he caught while waiting outside the railway station, de- veloped into p leurisy and ended fatally on February 24, 1885, at Rome. His remains were brought to his home and interred March 3d, at Sing Sing.

Dr. Platt Rogers Halsted Sawyer, born August 14, 1834, at Westport, N. Y., studied medicine with Dr. Bridges, at Ogdensburgh, N. Y., while engaged as principal of the High School of that town. After a course of lectures at the University of Vermont he

George Jackson FisherMit.

581

THE MEDICAL PROFESSION.

entered the Albany Medical College, from which he graduated. At the opening of the Civil War he was commissioned assistant surgeon of the Forty-second Regiment, New York Volunteers, and was promoted to surgeon of the Ninety-sixth Regiment. After the muster out he practiced at Port Henry, N. Y., then at Gloversville, and in 1868 settled at Bedford, West- chester County, where he died March 31, 1885.

He was for two terms elected justice of the peace, and in 1881 was elected school commissioner and re- elected in 1884. He was a member, from its organi- zation, of Stewart Hart Post, G. A. R., Mount Kisco, and its commander for one year ; and an earn- est and active member of Kisco Lodge, F. and A. M. Among other offices he had held were those of vice- president of the New York State Medical Society, president of the Westchester County Medical Society aud for several years he was a trustee of the Bedford Academy.

Norge Jackson Fisher Mad.

BIOGRAPHY.

GEORGE JACKSON FISHER.

George Jackson Fisher, M.D., who has contributed more to the medical literature of Westchester County than any man either living or dead, was born in Westchester County, N. Y., November 27, 1825, and is a descendant of the early Dutch settlers, whose original name was Vischer. His father, who had been a merchant in the city of New York, removed to the ceutral part of the State, and engaged in agricultural pursuits, when his son George was but eleven ycars of age. To his somewhat solitary life in the country the doctor attributes his fondness for Nature. To him she has always had " a voice of gladness, and a smile and eloquence of beauty," and much of his life has been spent in holding communion with her visi- ble forms. This is the secret of his preference for rural and village life, instead of the allurements of a city practice. The principal portion of his office pu- pilage was under the direction of Dr. Nelson Nivison, then of Mecklenburgh, Tompkins County, N. Y .. now professor of physiology and pathology in the Medical Department of the Syracuse University. Dr. Fisher attended his first courses of medical lectures at the Medical Department of the University of Buf- falo, at which time Austin Flint, Sr., Frank Hastings

Hamilton, James P. White and other celebrated pro- fessors gave character to this excellent school of med- icine. He next attended the lectures aud demonstra- tions at the Medical Department of the University of the City of New York, where Mott, Pattison and Draper were the great luminaries of science and practice. Here he graduated in the class of 1849. Immediately thereafter he entered into a copartner- ship with his preceptor. In 1851 he removed to Sing Sing, where he has continued his practice to thie present time. Iu his time he has performed most of the important operations of surgery, including ampu- tations, trephining, ovariotomy, the Cesarean sec- tion, the removal of uterine fibroids, and, on two occasions, the ligation of the commou carotid artery, with successful results. He has been the recipient of many honors, among which was the honorary degree of Master of Arts, in 1859, from Madison Univer- sity; twice the presidency of the Medical Society of Westchester County ; in 1864, vice- president of theMedical Society of the State of New York, and in 1874 president of the same; cor- responding member of the Bostou Gynæcological Society ; Fellow of the New York Academy of Medi- cine; member of the New York Lyceum of Natural History ; corres. ponding member of the New York Historical Society ; permanent member of the Medieal Society of the State of New York, and of the American Medical Association; delegate from the Medical Society of the State of New York to the International Medical Con- gress in Philadelphia, in 1876, etc. He has also held the office of president of the village of Sing Sing, and was for several years physician and surgeon of the State Prisons at Sing Sing, for both males and females. For twenty years he was brigade-surgeon, N. Y. S. M., and, for a like period, United States examining surgeon in the Pension Bureau.

On several occasions he served as a volunteer sur- geon for the United States Sanitary Commission, after the great battles of the Rebellion, and also as medical director of a floating hospital.

His professional essays which have been thus far printed amount to not less than one thousand octavo pages. They embracc a variety of interesting topics ; among them are the following titles : " Biographical Sketches of Deceased Physicians of Westchester County, N. Y." (1861) ; "On the Animal Substances employed as Medicines by the Ancients " (1862) ; " Diploteratology," or an essay on "Double-Mon- sters " ( Trans. of the Med. Soc. of the State of N. Y., 1865-68) ; "A Brief History of the Discovery of the Cir- culation of the Blood" (Pop. Sci. Monthly, July, 1877) ; "Teratology " (Johnson's Universal Cyclopædia, vol. iv.); " Influence of the Maternal Mind in the Production of Malformations " (Amer. Journ. of Insanity, vol. xxvi. January, 1870) ; "Sketches of the Lives, Times

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HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

and Works of some of the Old Masters of Anatomy, Surgery and Medicine " (consisting of twenty sketches, in Annals of Anatomy and Surgery, vols. ii .- viii., 1880-83); "History of Surgery " (International Encyclopædia of Surgery," vol. vi., N. Y., 1886). Several minor articles could be added to the above list.

Dr. Fisher has shown a profound interest in the literature of his profession, both ancient and mod- ern. His. library, which is quite well known to the medical scholars of the country, contains about four thousand volumes, including many of the rarest books now existing, in most of the depart- ments of the healing art. There is, perhaps, no collection of the medical classics equal to his to be found in private hands in the United States. It includes large series of works illustrating the devel- opment of anatomy, surgery, materia medica and medicine, from the earliest periods to the present time. His collections of works pertaining to the history of medicine, and the biography of physicians and surgeons, are quite extensive.

The doctor has also been to great pains and cost in collecting the bibliography of teratology, a subject to which he has bestowed special attention. Mention should also be made of his collection of medals relat- ing to the medical profession ; and, also, of his collec- tion of more than one thousand engraved portraits of celebrated physicians, surgeons, anatomists and medi- cal authors. His library is enriched by a well- selected collection of medical essays, embracing about three thousand pamphlets, all carefully cata- logued and indexed. His private museum contains collections of typical objects in conchology, palæon- tology, mineralogy and archæology. The latter de- partment is quite rich in specimens of the stone implements of the American aborigines.

It is to Dr. Fisher that we are indebted for the his- tory of the town of Ossining, which forms one of the chapters of this work.

THE JAY FAMILY.

The Jay family,1 so well-known throughout West- chester County, and indeed throughout the whole `country, trace their ancestry to Pierre Jay, who left France on the revocation of the Edict of Nantes.

He was an active and opulant merchant, extensively and profitably engaged in commerce. He married Judith, a daughter of Mr. Francois, a merchant in Rochelle. One of her sisters married M. Mouchard, whose son was a director of the French East India Company. Pierre Jay had three sons and one daugh- ter. The sons were Francis, who was the eldest; Augustus, born March 23, 1665 and Isaac. The daughter's name was Frances. Mr. Jay seems to have been solicitous to have one of his sons educa- ted in England. He first sent his eldest, but he un- fortunately died of sea-sickness on the passage.

Notwithstanding this distressing event, he immedi- atcly sent over Augustus, who was then only twelve years old. In 1683, he recalled Augustus and sent him to Africa, but to what part or for what purpose is now unknown.

During the absence of Augustus, the persecution of the Protestants in France became severe ; and Pierre Jay became one of its objects. Dragoons were quar- tered in his house, and his family were subjected to serious annoyance. He was imprisoned in the castle of Rochelle, but was released through the influence of some Roman Catholic connections. Having at the time several vessels out at sea which were ex- pected soon in port, he desired a Protestant pilot in his employ to take the first of these vessels that should arrive to a place agreed upon the Island of Rhé. The ship that arrived first was one from Spain, of which he was the sole owner. The pilot was faithful to his trust, and in due time Mr. Jay reached England and rejoined his family, whom he had sent to England some time before, at Plymouth.

Augustus Jay returned to France from Africa, ignorant of these family changes. As it was unsafe to appear in Rochelle openly, he was secreted for some time by his aunt, Madame Mouchard, a Protestant, but whose husband was a Roman Catholic. With the help of his friends he escaped to the West Indies, and thence to Charleston, S. C. The climate proving unfavorable, he removed to Philadelphia and after- wards to Esopus on the Hudson River, where he entered into business ; but ultimately settled in New York. Here-visited France and England in 1692, and saw his father and sister ; his mother had lately died.

In 1697 he married, in New York Anna Maria, daughter of Balthazar Bayard, the descendant of a Protestant professor of theology at Paris in the reign of Louis XIII., who had been compelled to leave Paris and take refuge with his wife and children in Holland ; whence several members of the family came to America. Mrs. Jay was a woman of eminent piety. It is mentioned that she died while on ber knees in prayer.

Augustus Jay lived to the good old age of eighty- six, respected and esteemed by his fellow citizens, and died in New York where he had pursued his calling as a merchant with credit and success, March 10, 1751.

Peter Jay, only son of Augustus, married Mary, daughter of Jacobus VanCortlandt, January 20, 1728. Like his father, he was a merchant in the city of New York. Having earned a fortune which added to the property he had acquired by inheritance and mar- riage, he thought sufficient, he resolved when little more than forty years old, to retire into the country, and for this purpose purchased a farm at Rye, where he died April 17, 1782.

James Jay, third son of Peter, born October 16, 1732, became Sir James Jay, Kt .; he resided for some years in England, and returned after the Revolution

1 The Jay family and Jolin Clarkson Jay, M.D., (compiled from a sketch of the Jay family in " Baird's History of Rye.")

John R. Day

583

THE MEDICAL PROFESSION.

to New York, where he lived uutil his death, Octo- ber 20, 1815. On his return from England in 1784 or 1785, he brought propositions from the Countess of Huntington to some of the States of the Union, for establishing settlements of emigrants among the Indians, with a view to civilizing them, and convert- ing them to Christianity. General Washington in a letter to him dated January 25, 1785, expresses his entire approval of the plan, and suggests that it should be brought before Congress.1

Peter, fourth son of Peter Jay, and brother of the former, was born December 19, 1734, and married in 1789, Mary Duyckinek. Though he had the misfor- tune of losing his eyesight in early life through an attack of small-pox, many interesting stories are re- lated of his ingenuity and sagacity and he is said to have possessed a fine mind and an excellent character. John Jay, sixth son of Peter, was born December 12, 1745. His boyhood was spent at Rye and New Rochelle. He was admitted to the bar in 1768. On April 28, 1774, he married Sarah, daughter of William Livingston, afterwards governor of New Jersey. Hc soon took a foremost position in the politics of the country, and was prominent in the debates of the first and the second Continental Congress. In 1777 he was appointed chief justice of the State of New York. In 1778 he was elected president of Congress. In 1779 he was sent as Minister to Spain, and from thence, in 1780, went to Paris as Commissioner to assist in the negotiation of a treaty of peace with Great Britain. He returned to New York in 1784, after an absence of five years, and was received with tokens of esteem and admiration. December 21, 1784, he was appointed by Congress, secretary for foreign affairs, and held the office for five years. He was one of the con- tributors to The Federalist. In 1789 he was appointed chief justice of the United States,-an office which he was the first to fill. In 1794 he was sent as special Minister to London, upon a delicate and most im- portant mission, relating to difficulties growing out of unsettled boundaries and certain commercial com- plications. He discharged this duty with great ability, and upon his return to America, in 1795, was elected by a large majority Governor of the State of New York. At the end of three years he was re- elected, aud at the expiration of a second term was solicited to become a candidate for election a third time. But he had determined to renounce public life, and though nominated again in 1800, to the office of chief justice of the United States, declined the honor, and retired to his paternal estate, at Bed- ford ; a property-part of the Van Cortlandt estate- which his father had acquired by marriage with Mary, a daughter of Jacobus Van Cortlandt. There he lived for twenty-eight years a peaceful and hon- ored life. In 1827 he was seized with severe illness, and after two years of weakness and suffering, was

1." Writings of Washington," by Jared Sparks, Vol. IX., pp. 86-89.

struck with palsy, May 14, 1829, and died three days after. He was buried in the family cemetery at Rye. His publie reputation as a patriot and statesman of the Revolution was second only to that of Washing- ton, and his private character as a man and a Chris- tian is singularly free from stain or blemish.2

Peter Augustus, eldest son of John Jay, was born January 24, 1776. He graduated from Columbia College in 1794 and studied law under Peter J. Monroc. He married Mary Rutherford, daughter of General Matthew Clarkson, and became prominent in the legal profession and public affairs. He was a member of the State Assembly in 1816; recorder of New York in 1818; a member of the convention which framed the constitution of the State in 1821, and for many years president of the New York Histori- cal Society, trustee of Columbia College, etc. He re- ceived the degree of LL.D. in 1831, from Harvard, and in 1835 from Columbia. He died February 20, 1843.

John Clarkson Jay, M.D., eldest son of Peter Augustus, was born September 11, 1808, and mar- ried Laura, daughter of Nathaniel Prime. Heis the pro- prietor of the estate at Rye,and the present well-known representative of the family iu Westchester County. After a thorough preparation in private schools, among which were those of the blind teacher, Mr. Nelson, and the McCulloch school at Morristown, N. Y., he en- tered Columbia College, from which he graduated, to- gether, with the late Secretary of State, Hamilton Fish, and many other distinguished men in the class of 1827.3 In 1831 he took his degree as M.D. He has been a deep student of natural history, especially of conchology, and the valuable collection of shells, formerly iu his possession, and which is now in the New York Museum of Natural History, having been purchased by Miss Wolf and presented to that in- stitution by her, in memory of her father, has the rep- utation of being the finest in the country. On this branch Dr. Jay has written several pamphlets, among which are the following: "Catalogue of Recent Shells, etc.," New York, 1835, Svo, pp. 56; " De- scription of New and Rare Shells, with four plates," New York, 1836, 2d ed., pp. 78; "A Catalogue, &c., together with a description of new and Rare Species," New York, pp. 125, 4to., ten plates. The article on shells in the narrative of Commodore Perry's expedi- tion to Japan, is also by him. He has been con- nected with many prominent literary and social or- ganizatious, both in Westchester County and in the city of New York, where he spends much of his time. He has been for many years a trustec of Columbia College, and has, at two different periods, served as trustee of the College of Physicians and Surgcons of the City of New York. He was one of the founders and at one time recording secretary of the New York Yacht Club, the annals of which will show the lively interest which he took in its management and general

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History of Westchester county : New York, including Morrisania, Kings Bridge, and West Farms, which have been annexed to New York City, Vol. I, Part 149

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898, ed Publication date: 1886 Publisher: Philadelphia : L.E. Preston & Co. Number of Pages: 1354

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898, ed
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.E. Preston & Co.
Number of Pages: 1354