A history of Scioto County, Ohio, together with a pioneer record, Part 75

Author: Evans, Nelson W. (Nelson Wiley), 1842-1913
Publication date: 1903
Publisher: Portsmouth, O. N. W. Evans
Number of Pages: 1612

USA > Ohio > Scioto County > A history of Scioto County, Ohio, together with a pioneer record > Part 75

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In 1832, he was raised to $800.00 and in 1833, to $1,000.

In 1834, he evidently "saw" the assessor for his income went down to $400.00, and all the other doctors' incomes likewise.

In 1835, his estimate was $600.00; in 1842, $800.00; in 1843, $1,250; in 1846, $1,500; in 1848, $2,000 ; and in 1849, $2,500.

In 1831, at the grand Fourth of July celebration he was on the committee on toasts.

In 1832, he had a drug store in Portsmouth in partnership with Dr. Pattillo.

In 1832, he was Supervisor of the East Ward in Portsmouth, an office corresponding to Street Commissioner, and for his service re- ceived $4.50 for the entire year.

In 1832, he delivered several lectures before the Portsmouth Ly- ceum.

In 1833, he was sent to Columbus to lobby for the Lateral Canal and the town appropriated $50.00 for his expenses.

In 1835. he was Health Officer in Portsmouth.

Dr. Hempstead was not only a scholar, but a student. He was fond of public functions, and delivered a number of public lectures. He took a great interest in public education.

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In 1839, he was made School Examiner and Visitor in Ports- mouth and continued in that position until 1848.

The front of the town was the all absorbing question in 1829; and Dr. Hempstead was on a committee of the Common Council on this subject.

From 1824 to 1849, his home was the Neill home at the corner of Third and Market streets.

In 1848, he built the R. Bell homestead, and moved there in 1849. He owned twenty-one acres of land there and resided in that house until 1858, when he retired from the practice of medicine in Portsmouth and removed to Hanging Rock until 1865 when he re- tired for good, and devoted himself to the study of Natural Science.

In 1872, he returned to Portsmouth where he continued to re- side the remainder of his life.

In 1879, he published a pamphlet "History and Development of the American Continent."

In 1879. the Ohio University gave him the degree of LL .. D.

In 1880, he was made a member of the American Association for the advancement of science at Boston, Mass. He was at one time president of the Ohio Medical Society.

In 1880. he delivered a lecture in Portsmouth on "Puritan In- tolerance and Persecution."

His wife died April 15, 1875; they had two daughters and one son1. His daughter. Margaret J. married Benjamin B. Gaylord, and his daughter Harriet married Gaylord B. Norton. His son, Sam- uel B. Hempstead, was widely known through Southern Ohio, and died in 1873, leaving a large family.

In 1874, when Portsmouth elected a Board of Education by wards. Dr. Hempstead was elected without opposition from the Fifth Ward, and was the first President of the new Board. He re- signed in 1875.

During the cholera epidemics in 1832, 1835, 1849 and 1851, he was constantly employed in combating the disease, and had great success.

In 1877, he was selected to participate in the cememonies of be- ginning the construction of the Scioto Valley Railroad at Ports- mouth.

After retiring from the practice of medicine he devoted a great portion of his time to the study of archaeology. He explored all the works of the Mound Builders in the vicinity of Portsmouth and made drawings and maps. His writings on this subject and his maps and drawings are preserved in the archives of the public schools, and are invaluable. as the earthworks have been destroyed.

He was perhaps the most learned man in his city; and he was undoubtedly the greatest student, of his own profession, of natural science and archaeology. He had the faculty of imparting know-

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ledge in the most interesting and entertaining manner. He was emi- nent in his profession and stood at the head of it, not only in his own town, but in the state. He was public spirited and benevolent. He favored every enterprise for the good of the community. He was a great worker in whatever interested him, and he never tired.

As a public lecturer he was most instructive and entertaining.

He presented his medical library to the Scioto County Medical Society, and in his honor, it changed its name to the Hempstead Memorial Academy of Medicine.

When he came to Portsmouth, it was a forest and wilderness. He remembered when the Scioto Bottoms stood in the original tim- ber, and when all back of Third street in Portsmouth was forest, with the low ground grown up with horse weeds.

Dr. Hempstead endured enough hardship and exposure in the practice of medicine to have killed a dozen men, yet he survived, hale and hearty, until 1883, when on July 9, he died of a cancer on his face.

Joseph Corson

was born January 20th, 1821, at Plymouth Meeting, Pennsylvania, a suburb of Philadelphia. He was reared a Quaker. His father was Allen Wright Corson, and his mother's maiden name was Mary Eg- bert. He was educated at Swarthmore College, and studied medicine at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. He graduated in medicine in 1841. He located at Plymouth Meeting and practiced medicine with his uncle, Dr. Hiram Corson. In 1843, he located in Jasper, Pike County, Ohio, and began the practice of medicine. June 29, 1843, he was married at Jasper, Ohio, to Martha Hyde Cutler, daughter of Jonathan and Persis Cutler. He removed to Philadelphia in 1845, and returned to Portsmouth, Ohio, in 1846, where he formed a partnership with Dr. G. S. B. Hempstead. In 1861, he went to Vir- ginia and attended the wounded of Company "G", Ist Ohio Volunteer Infantry .. At the battle of Bull Run he was in the Federal hospital. attending the wounded, when the hospital was surrounded by the rebel Black Horse Cavalry. He practiced medicine in Portsmouth, Ohio, until his death, July 7, 1866. He was a Blue Lodge Mason. He was a public spirited, patriotic citizen, always ready to do and suffer for others. He was of a most generous and kindly disposition. He stood high among his professional brethren, and was regarded among the best of his profession.

William Jefferson McDowell

was born September 14, 1821, in the town of Portsmouth, Ohio, the son of Captain John McDowell and Mary Whiting Jefferson, his wife, a descendant of Thomas Jefferson, the third President. His father has a separate sketch herein. He attended the Portsmouth Public Schools and afterwards Augusta College, Augusta, Kentucky. He attended lectures in medicine, first at Louisville, Kentucky, and after-

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wards at Philadelphia. He began the practice of medicine at Ports- mouth, Ohio, in the spring of 1845. He was assessed that year and the following at $200. In 1847, he was assessed at $500, in 1848 and 1849, at $800, and in 1850, at $2,500. In 1846, he was elected a trus- tee of the public schools. He was appointed Pension Examining Surgeon, January 10, 1863, and was county jail physician in 1865, 1807 and 1869. He never sought or held any public offices which would trench in his time as a physician. He was wholly devoted to his profession. He loved it because it gave him an opportunity to minister to his fellow men. He never married, and his profession and his church were wife and family to him. As a physician, he very quick- ly rose to the head of his profession and remained there. As a citi- zen, his character was perfect. All sorts and conditions of the men, women, and children of his acquaintance, admired and loved him. His religion was so deep and earnest that in his visits to the sick and dy- ing, he ministered to their spiritual wants, as well as to their bodily diseases. He recognized the true type of Christianity wherever he met it : and his type of Christianity was known and recognized by all who knew him, saints and sinners alike. He was modest. quiet, and retiring in all his ways, but his true worth was quickly known, wher- ever he was met. He lived the fifty-seven years of his life in one com- munity, without a single word of slander or calumny ever thought of. or uttered against him. He was an apostle of purity known and read of by all men. When he lay dead in his home, the Roman Catholic Sisters knelt by his open coffin and prayed. On his tombstone are cut the words, "The Beloved Physician", and they express in three words just how he stood in the community. His life was not long in years ; but was full of good deeds, and yields a grateful incense to all who re- member him.

James M. Shackelford

died June 20, 1872, at Des Moines, Iowa, of brain fever, aged about 65 years. He removed from Kentucky to Portsmouth in the winter of 1841 and 1812. January 21, 1842, is the first mention of him in Portsmouth, in the Portsmouth Tribune of that date. For nearly 30 years he was a leading and popular physician in Portsmouth. During most of the time he was connected with a drug store on Front street. In 1869, he removed to Des Moines, Iowa, where he owned large property. He had visited Portsmouth in 1872, and was in excellent health and spirits. His name and reputation was a household word in Portsmouth. His character and history in Portsmouth is deserving of a much more extended notice than this, but it was impossible to ob- tain anything from his surviving relatives and hence the paucity of this notice. Dr. Shackleford was an old fashioned Southern gentle- man. He built the residence now occupied by Capt. E. B. Moore and it was his family home. He had a custom, a most excellent one, of charging his patients for keeping them well.

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Obadiah Jackson Hall

was born in Northfield, New Hampshire, August 10, 1826, the young- est child of Obadiah and Hannah (Forrest ) Hall. His grandfather, William Forrest, was a Revolutionary soldier, whose services are men- tioned in the Pioneer Record of this work. Doctor Hall's boyhood and youth were spent at his birthplace, where he attended the public schools. At the age of seventeen years, he went to Wolfboro, New Hampshire, and studied medicine with his brother, Doctor J. F. Hall. From there he entered Dartmouth College, where he took the course in medicine and graduated in 1850. In 1851, he began the practice of medicine in Lancaster, New Hampshire; but on account of the se- verity of the climate, he came to Ohio, and for ten years practised at Empire and Junior Furnaces. In 1861, for a period of about 90 days, he acted as substitute for F. B. Mussey, surgeon in the 33rd O. V. I. He would have accepted military service, but owing to ill health was compelled to forego it. On May 7, 1862, he was married at Ports- mouth, Ohio, to Mary Elizabeth Boynton, of Laconia, New Hamp- shire, and practised medicine a short time thereafter in Portsmouth. He then went to Powellsville and practised there until 1865, when he returned to Portsmouth. In his youth he was a member of the Meth- odist Church, but after his marriage he and his wife connected with the First Presbyterian Church of Portsmouth. He had three chil- dren. The eldest, Bessie M., was educated in the public schools of Portsmouth and taught for eleven years, from 1886 to 1893. From 1893 to 1895 she was in Mt. Hoyloke College preparing for work as a High School teacher. From 1895 to 1898, she taught in the High School of Portsmouth. On June 23, 1898, she was married to Arthur F. Titus of Portsmouth. They have two children : Grace Elizabeth and Helen Hall. Doctor O. J. Hall's second daughter, Grace For- rest, was born in Portsmouth and educated in the Portsmouth public schools. For several years, she has made her home in New York City. Doctor Hall died in Portsmouth, Ohio, of pulmonary con- sumption May 30, 1868. After his death, his widow taught in the public schools and was one of the most efficient teachers Portsmouth ever had. She was a woman of fine intellect, quick perception and sturdy New England worth. Her health failed in 1887 and she re- turned to New Hampshire, hoping to be benefited thereby, but failed to recuperate and returned to Portsmouth, where she died September 1, 1889, at the age of sixty-one.

Cyrus Myron Finch

was born April 14, 1831, at Dunbar, Pennsylvania, a son of John Finch, who was a descendant of one of three brothers, who came to America during the reign of Charles II. His mother was Margaret Murphy Finch. He received his literary education at the Mt. Pleas- ant College, in the medical schools of Ohio, and in Bellevue, New York, and graduated M. D. in 1862.

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He was united in marriage with Mary E. Bruner, daughter of S. N. Bruner, Esq., of Wheelersburg, in 1857. He settled first at Wheelersburg. Scioto County, Ohio, and at Portsmouth, at the close of the war, where he practiced for over thirty years. At the outbreak of the Rebellion, he went to Columbus, Ohio, to be examined as a Surgeon and stood the highest in a class of one hundred and forty. He served faithfully and efficiently all through the war, traveling over nearly all the entire South. Doctor Finch was Surgeon of the 9th Ohio Cavalry and also division Surgeon of Kilpatrick's Cavalry. He participated in the Atlantic Campaign, "Sherman's March to the Sea" and through the Carolinas, and was at the surrender of General John- ston. After the war he identified himself with the great societies which were organized to perpetuate the memory of its heroism and hardships. He was one of the founders of "Bailey Post" and a mem- ber of the "Loyal Legion." Doctor Finch served as Trustee of the State Deaf and Dumb Asylum at Columbus for four years during the administration of Governor Charles Foster. In April, 1884, Gov- ernor Hoadley appointed him Superintendent of the Columbus Insane Asylum where he served for four years.

As a physician he was known as one of the most advanced men in Southern Ohio, and as a surgeon he had no equal. He was pro- gressive and kept fully abreast of the times. He made a special study of mental and nervous diseases and was widely recognized as an ex- pert in insanity, being frequently summoned long distances to give expert testimony. Doctor Finch's contributions to medical litera- ture consisted in reports of cases made to medical journals and various articles published in pamphlets. He died at his residence in Ports- mouth, March 19, 1891. The story of his illness is the history of an iron will and constitution battling against the steady encroachment of a fatal malady, from a period that dates back to the war. From the time he left the army, his strength sapped by the fatigues and hardships of that long conflict, existence to him was one battlefield, where the forces of life and death were constantly arrayed in deadly warfare, and where every onslaught left death's ensign planted nearer the mortal battlements. It was a brave struggle made against odds which have appalled weaker natures and death may well plume himself on his victory. for he had unhorsed and laid in the dust a gallant knight.

James Phelps Bing

was born in Gallia County, Ohio. September 14. 1822. His father, William Bing, was a native of Augusta County, Virginia, and his mother, Nancy ( Phelps) Bing came from New Haven Connecticut. The elements of an education received in the little log school house of. that day were not satisfying to him, and he went to the Ohio Universi- ty at Athers, Ohio. After this, he taught school in Ohio, Kentucky and Louisiana. In 1851, he received his degree from Starling Medi-

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cal College of Columbus, Ohio. The Doctor practised medicine in Ironton, Ohio, eight years, in Pomeroy, Ohio, ten years, exclusive of the first and last years of the Civil War, and in Portsmouth, Ohio, for thirty-one years. From October 3, 1861, to August 31, 1862, he was Assistant Surgeon of the 53rd O. V. I. During the last year of the war, he was Surgeon in charge of Camp Thomas, near Colum- bus, Ohio, the station of the 18th, U. S. I. On December 25, 1867, Doctor Bing located in Portsmouth and was a prominent figure there until his death. During this period his was an active life. He was one of the earliest of the regularly appointed Insurance Examiners. On April 8, 1874, he was elected President of the Ohio Medical So- ciety. He was jail physician for thirteen years from 1886 to 1899. On the Hospital Board, he served continuously from May, 1888, un- til his resignation July 8, 1897. He was twice a member of the U. S. Pension Examining Board. While in Meigs County, he was elect- ed Coroner. In his youth, he connected himself with the church and was a consistent member for a long lifetime. At the time of his death, he was the only Elder in active service of the original session of the Second Presbyterian Church, organized in 1875. His practical christianity was manifested in large work among the poor for which a physician could expect no compensation. The Doctor was married on November 5, 1851, in Columbus, Ohio, to Minerva A. Powers, of that city, the Rev. William Preston, Rector of Trinity Church, officiat- ing. His death occurring April 8, 1900, was the peaceful ending of a long and useful life. The widow and two children : Augustus O. Bing of Cincinnati and Mrs. A. S. Dutton, of Gallipolis, Ohio, survive him.

Henry C. Beard,

Physician and Surgeon, was born December 21, 1839, near Middle- brook, Augusta County, Virginia, the youngest son of William Beard and Jane ( Ewing) Beard. He came to Ohio in October, 1859. and located at Jasper in Pike County. He soon after began the study of medicine and took his first course of lectures at the Medical Col- lege of Ohio, session of 1860-61, at Cincinnati, Ohio. On August II. 1862, at the age of twenty-four, he enlisted in Company C, Ist Ohio Volunteer Heavy Artillery, for three years. He was promoted to Hospital Steward January 1, 1863. He was promoted to Assistant Surgeon, January 4, 1865, and was mustered out with the regiment, July 25. 1865, at Knoxville, Tennessee, and located in Lucasville, Ohio. In October, 1865, he located at California, Pike County, Ohio, where he remained for four years. In June, 1869, he graduated from the Cincinnati Medical College of Medicine and Surgery. In 1869, he removed to Portsmouth and engaged in the drug business; but on account of failing health abandoned it and resumed the more ac- tive duties of the practice of medicine. He located at Lucasville, May 27, 1879, and was actively engaged in his profession until his

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death. He was married December 25, 1860, to Mary Ellen Noel, daughter of David and Nancy Morgan Noel of near Portsmouth, O. He had three sons : David Francis, employed with Martindale & Ed- munds of Lucasville: Michael Jacob, a physician in Lucasville, lately married to Catharine Wheeler Dever, daughter of Joseph Dever ; and Roscoe Eugene, employed as a clerk in a furniture factory at St. Jos- eph, Michigan. Our subject was elected Vice President of the Scioto County Medical Society in 1878, was one of the Board of Censors of the Hempstead Memorial Academy of Medicine in 1884, and was also President at one time. He was made a Master Mason in Lucasville Lodge F. and A. M. No. 365, June 13, 1895. Although he did not belong to any church, he took great interest in all religious move- ments. He was a friend to the poor as well as the rich. His motto was, "Do unto others as you wish others to do unto you." He (lied August 21, 1895.

Alonzo Blair Richardson

was born near Harrisonville, Scioto County, Ohio, September II, 1852. His father's name was Edward Warren Richardson, and his mother's maiden name was Mary Blair. His father was a farmer, and died May 25, 1864, at the age of forty-four, a member of Com- pany "F," 140th Ohio Volunteer Infantry. He enlisted May 2, 1862, and was appointed a Sergeant of the Company. His widow is now living at the age of eighty-three. Dr. Richardson was born on a farm and educated in the country schools until the age of sixteen, when he began teaching. He taught for two years and entered Ohio University, Athens, Ohio, at the age of eighteen, where he remained two years. He then began the study of medicine in Portsmouth, Ohio, under Dr. David Barnes Cotton. He attended the first course of lectures at Ohio Medical College, in Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1874 and 1875, and was graduated in medicine at Bellevue Hospital Medical College, New York City in the spring of 1876. He was appointed Assistant physician at Athens Asylum for Insane immediately on his graduation from Bellevue. He resigned in May of 1878. He was in practice in Portsmouth from that time until 1881. He was a partner with Dr. Cotton in 1878, and was the City Jail physician in 1879. He was appointed Medical Superintendent of Athens Asylum for the In- sane in March, 1881, and resigned in May, 1890. He practised medi- cine in Cincinnati, Ohio, until April. 1892, and was then appointed Medical Superintendent of the Columbus Asylum for the Insane. In the spring of the same vear he was appointed by Gov. Mckinley as member of the Commission to locate a new Asylum for the Insane in the eastern part of the State. In the Spring of 1893 he was appointed a five year member of the Board of Trustees to build the new asylum. which the commission had located at Massillon, Ohio. He continued Superintendent of the Columbus State Hospital (Columbus Asylum

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for the Insane) until March, 1898. He was then elected Superin- tendert of the Massillon State Hospital, and equipped and opened this institution in August, 1898. He resigned the superintendency of the hospital in October, 1899, to accept the superintendency of the Government Hospital for the Insane, Washington, D. C., which posi- tion he still holds. In his political views he has always been a Repub- lican. He is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. He was married October 26, 1876, to Miss Julia D. Harris, of Athens, Ohio. They have four children, William W., born at Athens, Ohio, in Oc- tober, 1877, a graduate of the Ohio State University in 1899, grad- uated from the Medical Department, University of Pennsylvania, in June, 1902; Mary Bertha, born in June, 1879, at Portsmouth, Ohio, married to W. G. Neff, Columbus, Ohio, in June, 1901 ; Edith H., born at Athens, Ohio, in October 1881, now a student at Mt. Holyoke College, Mass., and Helen, born in 1888 at Athens, Ohio.

Dr. Richardson has written numerous articles on subjects relat- ed to insanity and mental pathology. He is a member of the Ohio State Medical Society, The American Medical Association, the Ameri- can Medico-Psychological Association, the New York Medico-Legal Society and the Cosmos Club of Washington, D. C. Dr. Richardson stands at the head of his profession as an expert in diseases affecting the mind and in all forms of insanity. He has a life position,-the highest that the government could confer on one of his profession. In his specialty he has a national reputation.

Edwin Sanders Ricketts

was born May 18, 1863 in Rome, Lawrence County, Ohio. His father was Jerome Robinson Ricketts and his mother, Rachael Mc- Laughlin. There were three sons and one daughter in the family. His father was from Front-Royal, Va., and his mother was born in Rome, Lawrence County, Ohio. Her father, Daniel Mclaughlin was Scotch-Irish and came from Vermont in 1818. His father's people were Hugenots originally. They went to Holland to escape the per- secutions of the French Catholics and then to the United States. James McLaughlin of New Hampshire, father of David McLaughlin, was a Captain in the Revolutionary War and at the battle of Bunker Hill. His grand-father, John Ricketts died of cholera in 1833. Our subject attended the public schools of Proctorsville and graduated at Marshall College in West Virginia in 1871. He was a clerk in his father's store from 1871 to 1873 and then began the study of medi- cine. He attended Miami Medical College and graduated in October, 1877. He located in Portsmouth at once and remained there until September, 1887. He then went to Europe for one year and was a pupil of Dr. Lawson, of Birmingham, England. He studied surgical diseases of women and abdominal surgery. He studied in London, Vienna, Berlin and Paris. He located in Cincinnati and began to

DR. EDWIN S. RICKETTS.

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practice in 1888, and has been there ever since. His office is Num- ber 408, Broadway. His specialties are abdominal surgery and opera- tive gynecology. He is a member of the American Medical Asso- ciation, of the British Gynecological Society ; President of the Ameri- can Association of Obstetrics and Gynecologists. 1902; Ex-President of the Cincinnati Obstetrical Society ; member of the Cincinnati Acad- emy of Medicine; of the Ohio State Medical Society; of the Missis- sippi Valley Medical Society ; of the Tri-State Medical Society. He is an honorary member of the Hempstead Memorial Academy of Medi- cine and a member of the Miami Valley Medical Association. His residence is at Rose Hill, Avondale. He writes a great deal on med- ical subjects.

He first married Romaire McCormick, daughter of John R. Mc- Cormick, October 31, 1877. There was one child, Holliday M. Rick- etts, now 16 years of age, a student of Woodward High School, Cin- cinnati. His wife died January 17, 1886. He married Miss Anna E. Pursell, daughter of James Pursell, January 26, 1895.

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A history of Scioto County, Ohio, together with a pioneer record, Part 75

Author: Evans, Nelson W. (Nelson Wiley), 1842-1913 Publication date: 1903 Publisher: Portsmouth, O. N. W. Evans Number of Pages: 1612

Author: Evans, Nelson W. (Nelson Wiley), 1842-1913
Publication date: 1903
Publisher: Portsmouth, O. N. W. Evans
Number of Pages: 1612