History of the County of Westmoreland, Pennsylvania, with Biographical Sketches of Many of its Pioneers and Prominent Men, Part 87

Author: George Dallas Albert, editor
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But though willing enough to take the advice of honest Iago, and "put money in his purse," he has been known to lose a wealthy and liberal patient by insisting upon total abstinence from strong drink as a necessary condition before he would agree to continue his professional attendance, and by endeavoring to convince the gentleman that health and the use of ardent spirits are incompatible. He was known to attend, with all the kindness of a woman, and without hope of any pecuniary return, upon an unfortunate and wretched man who was raving with delirium tremens.

Having emigrated to this county when land was " cheap as dirt," and having had a good practice for thirty years, had Postlethwaite been as avaricious as he was talented, or had he flayed patients alive, as is now the practice of a portion of the profession, instead of a few thousand, he might have died worth several hundred thousand dollars. There is much standard or conventional joking about the fleecing of clients by lawyers; but the doctors now often improve on the practice of the other learned profession, and, in addition to the robbing of patients, they act on the sentiment of some sanguinary gentlemen of the high- way that " dead men tell no tales."

Dr. Postlethwaite was an honorable, truthful, and courageous gentleman, who discharged the duties of his profession with care and sincerity, to the best of his knowledge and ability; but yet he never held what nature designated as his proper place, the highest position in his profession. With the whole

force of his strong and acute intellect directed upon medicine, he ought to have been a doctor whose ipse diru would have passed without contradiction. But he had no professional enthusiasm, and, instead of medicine, the main inclination of his mind was towards politics and religion.

When Postleth waite was just emerging from youth into manhood two great political parties, known as Federalists and Democrats, came into existence. Dr. James Postleth waite, both from education and con- viction, became a decided Federalist. He gave his first vote to the Federal party, and adhered to it until it passed out of existence. After he had married and taken a position in society he became a copious and careful reader of political books and newspapers, and kept full and accurate notes of the results. So con- versant was he with American political history that he had few equals and no superior in that kind of in- formation. He knew well the history and reason of every article in the Federal Constitution, and he was as well or better acquainted with Hamilton, Adams, and other leading Federalist writers than with Wistar, Rush, and the eminent expounders of the medical profession. His fugitive contributions on political subjects would fill a volume, and are worthy of col- lection and republication. They were first published in the Greensburg anti-Democratic papers, and in the old Pittsburgh Gazette.

The newspaper contributions by which he acquired the greatest local notoriety are to be found in a con- troversy which he maintained with the Hon. Richard Coulter upon the subject of the administration of John Quincy Adams, in connection with the election of Jackson to the Presidenty. It occurred during the Presidency of Adams, and excited so deep and general an interest that the newspapers in which the dispute was published were in anxious and extensive requisition. Judge Coulter's articles were published in the Westmoreland Republican and Farmer's Chroni- cle, edited by Frederick A. Wise; those of Postle- thwaite appeared in the Greensburg Gazette, then under the editorial management of John Black.

Judge Coulter and Postlethwaite were the two ablest men in their professions and the first citizens in the social circle in which they lived, and so the controversy excited as much interest as an encounter between two choice lances, two champion knights, in the days of chivalry. As is usual in such cases, the respective friends of the two gentlemen claimed for either of them the honor of victory, but the com- batants themselves were willing to have it considered as a drawn battle. Each confessed that he had put forth his whole strength, and had found an antagonist worthy of his steel. At this distance of time, and with the changes produced by it, one would be better able to form a just judgment of the merits of the dis- tinguished adversaries in the controversy.

While Dr. Postlethwaite detested Gen. Jackson, he admired Daniel Webster. When a young man, and

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before he became religious, Dr. Postlethwaite some- times deviated into a common custom of " gentlemen of the old school" and interpolated a few oaths into his conversation. . His profession of religion and ! moral convictions led him to abandon this habit, and yet an instance is drawn where his irascible tempera- ment and his hatred of Gen. Jackson led him to re- lapse into a slight paroxysm of profanity. "About the years 1838 and 1839"-so a gentleman relates from his personal remembrance-" I sometimes consulted him as a physician. One day in conversation Webster became the subject, and the doctor lauded him as the greatest of living statesmen. I repeated a sarcastic remark, attributed to John Randolph, 'Daniel Web- ster is highly talented, but utterly corrupt; like a rot- ten mackerel in moonlight, or putrid meat in the dark, he shines and stinks, and stinks and chines.' The sarcasm excited the indignation of the doctor. He pronounced Randolph 'an accursed caitiff, incapable of any great and good action.' He defended Web- ster from the charge of being corrupt; and asserted that ' Andrew Jackson was the author of that d-d infamous falsehood.' Jackson feared and hated Web- ster, and wished to counteract the influence of his talents by falsehoods about his moral character. He then denounced Jackson as the worst man of the age, -a compound of cunning and ferocity. 'His flat- terers call him "the old Roman,"-the noblest Roman of them all.' Of all the Romans, remarked the doc- tor, 'he most closely resembles Caius Marius after he had imbued his hands in the blood of his fellow- citizens and trampled upon the liberties of his coun- try.'"

Of the force and severity of Dr. Postleth waite's satirical talents some idea may be conveyed by the following piece of information, obtained from a gen- tleman of unimpeachable veracity. An attempt was made to establish in Washington County, Pa., & news- paper with the name of The Democratic Eagle and Banner of the Cross. It was intended to promulgate and defend the principles of the most intense Democ- racy and the most liberal Christianity. Of both these Dr. Postlethwaite was the uncompromising enemy, and so he assailed the scheme in the Pittsburgh Gazette with such sarcasm and humor that at one blow he entirely annihilated it. In one of his figures he made the eagle go flying away with the cross in his beak.

One day, while discussing politics in a group of men, an impudent Democratic lawyer remarked to Postlethwaite in a sneering manner, "Obscurity is said to be an element in sublimity. Your arguments, doctor, should be sublime, for they are above my com- prehension."

"Sir," said Postlethwaite, "I have given you my arguments, but I cannot furnish you with intellect enough to understand them."

After the Federal party ceased to exist as a political organization, Postlethwaite became an anti-Mason,

and used his pen against secret societies. The Demo- crate had identified their party with Masonry, and so anti-Masonry was opposition to Democracy. For a time the Masonic brotherhood dwindled into insig- nificance, and the anti-Masons abandoned their party association. Dr. Postlethwaite became a Whig, and as he had given his first, so he gave his last vote against the Democratic party. Had the Federals continued to exist as a party, he never would have voted with any other political organization.

Dr. Postlethwaite was never an open and avowed skeptic, but, on the other hand, he was not a merely traditional Christian. His mind was too inquisitive and his disposition too bold to accept religion by pro- scription. The full vigor of his remarkable intellect was put forth to examine the internal and external evidences of Christianity, and the conclusions were faith in the Christian system, and reliance upon it for salvation. In the conviction of such a mind virtue gained a brilliant advantage, for on the side of reli- gion there were henceforth arrayed good character, industrious habits, an acute and active intellect, and extensive information.

His parents were Episcopalians, and Postlethwaite by education and baptism had been a nominal mem- ber of the Church of England, but after his marriage and location in Westmoreland County he left the Episcopalian denomination and connected himself with the Presbyterians. He was admitted to mem- bership during the pastorship of the Rev. William Speer, who for twenty years had charge of the churches of Unity and Greensburg.

The conversion of Dr. Postlethwaite was produced by the study of the Bible, the Westminster Catechism, and ecclesiastical history. With minds of the liberal kind change in politics and religion is not astonish- ing. They are accustomed to reason and open to conviction. There is a common habit with the mass of the people to denounce those who change their opinions under the names of "apostate" and "turn- cost." In good truth mankind are indebted for many benefits and blessings to turn-coats. But for a change of opinion Paul would have died a Pharisee, Martin Luther a Roman Catholic, and John Wesley a zeal- ous member of the Church of England. But for change of opinion Adams and Jefferson, Franklin and Washington would have died loyal subjects to the king of England.

Dr. Postlethwaite was so well acquainted with eccle- siastical history and polemical literature that there were few clergymen equal and none superior to him in this kind of information. It appears that from his arrival at his majority his mind had been much occu- pied with theological metaphysics. Two old letters," written to him by a brother, one in 1813, and the other in 1821, in both of which religion is the main subject, are still extant. The letters give evidence of thought, reading, and correct scholarship. It appears that Dr. Postlethwaite had a brother Samuel, who had gone to

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the South and located himself at Natchez, Miss., where he was engaged, with other persons, in the manufacture of salt and the raising and shipping of cotton. He held slaves, and says that he will en- deavor to increase his stock. "You seem," he writes to James, "to entertain terrible ideas of our situation here. I think that it is the finest country in the world, and that there is nothing to apprehend from the kind of property we hold. I am endeavoring to increase my force from eighty to one hundred."

Samuel was a decided Federalist in politics, and op- posed the war of 1812 and the administration of Madison. In his letter of 1821 he excuses himself to his brother for not openly connecting himself with a Christian Church and making a profession of religion. In his letter of 1818 he discusses, in answer to James, the profound metaphysical doctrine of the mode in which God rules the universe.

James Postlethwaite (as appears in a quotation in Samuel's letter) maintained the opinion that " nothing happens, nationally or individually, without the ex- press knowledge, permission, and direction of the Su- preme Governor of the universe."

His brother Samuel, on the contrary, was "inclined to believe that the universe is governed by not partial and particular but general laws; that man is endowed with reason and free will, and that this belief is per- fectly consistent with the dignity and wisdom of an omnipotent and omniscient Deity."1

In this metaphysical dispute, carried on between two brothers in 1813, flagrante bello, during the last war with England, James Postlethwaite occupied the orthodox Christian position, while Samuel leaned towards the philosophers. Alas for the vanity of this world, its wealth and wisdom, both Postlethwaites, like Harry Percy, are long ago food for worms.

James Postlethwaite was tall in stature, straight,. and well formed. He was about six feet in height, and in his prime of life weighed over two hundred pounds. His address was polished and dignified, and his countenance was noble and commanding. His nose was as Roman as that of Cato, the Censor. His eye was hazel in color. It was small, but keen and penetrating, and when excited in conversation it often kindled until it shot a fiery radiance. The Yankees or New England men compared Webster to a Deity. He was called "the God-like Daniel." When he was in England the ladies pronounced him to be a "very handsome man." One who saw Dr. Postlethwaite and Daniel Webster walking and talk- ing together on the Main Street of Greensburg, felt

confident that Postlethwaite was superior to him in all the qualities that constitute manly beauty or per- sonal perfection. If a painter had been solicited to depict upon canvas a beau ideal of the grave, pious, most respectable, and eloquent citizen whom Virgil has so beautifully described, he might have painted the likeness of James Postlethwaite.'

Dr. Postlethwaite had a number of brothers, sev- eral of whom emigrated to and lived in the South. He had four daughters and three sons. The oldest daughter married the distinguished lawyer and poli- tician, Charles Ogle, of Somerset. The second, Emily, died unmarried. The third, Matilda, married the Rev. W. W. Woodend, pastor of the Presbyterian Church of Saltsburg, Indiana Co., and the fourth, Sydney, married Dr. Alfred T. King, of Greensburg. His oldest son, William, settled in Somerset ; his second, Alexander, went to Natchez, and died there ; and Samuel, the youngest, died a bachelor in the State of Illinois. The Postlethwaites are all gone from Westmoreland.

`James Postlethwaite died in Greensburg, West- moreland Co., on the 17th of November, 1842, in the sixty-seventh year of his age. In his last years he re- ceived consolation from his religion, for, notwith- standing his high-toned temper and pride of charac- ter, he became a Christian of the most simple, humble, and child-like faith. He always listened to his spir- itual instructor with the deepest deference, both from the pulpit and his own fireside. He was buried in the Presbyterian graveyard, now the St. Clair Cemetery. "They who know personally or otherwise his quali- ties and his virtues may well wonder why there is no memorial over the grave of James Postlethwaite.

JOHN ORMSBY, M.D .- As we have just finished a sketch of the life of a learned, virtuous, and useful physician, an ornament of society, and an honor to his profession, it seems in accordance with the laws of nature and the rules of custom to give an account of a mountebank, who in every quality and attribute presented a contrast. Our object is not to make a great man appear to be greater by forcing him into juxtaposition with an obscure ignoramus, but to show how shamefully the people . of Pennsylvania have been imposed upon by the pretensions of medical charlatans and the impudence of empiricism.

Some time about 1889 or 1840 there came to Greens- burg a man who called himself John Ormsby, and who represented himself to be a physician by pro- fession. His age was about thirty years. He was of medium size. His countenance was not handsome, but open and pleasant, and his deportment was grave

1 The ideas of Samuel Postleth waite are beautifully verzifled in Pope's " Tamy on Man:"

" Remember, Man, the universal cause Acts not by partial but by general laws: He sees with equal eye, as God of all, A bero perish or a sparrow fall, Atoms or systems into ruin hurled, And now a bubble bursts and now a world."

" " Ac, veluti magno in populo spe coorta est, Seditio, wevitque animis ignobile vulgus- Jamque faces et saxa volant; furor arma ministrat; Tum, pietate gravein ac mentis al forte virum quem Conspexere, silent, arrectaque aribus adstant, Ille regit dictis animos, et pectore mulcet."

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and dignified. His head was very large, and as he was inclined to baldness he possessed quite an in- tellectual appearance. He always wore clean linen, dressed . well in dark-colored clothes, and carried a handsome silver-mounted cane. His habits were ap- parently good, and he had all the exterior decencies of a respectable man. He was a native of the United States, but of what part it is not known. He had resided for some years in Michigan, but came to Westmoreland directly from Butler County, where he had practiced medicine, and where he had married.

Ormaby did not pretend to have received any regu- lar medical education, or to have graduated at any regular medical institution. He alleged that he studied his profession with a celebrated German doc- tor, Dellenbach, who resided in Ohio, and practiced entirely on the uroscopic system of medicine, wherein the symptoms of disease are ascertained by an ex- amination of the urine of the patient. He exhibited a certificate from Dellenbach, stating that John Ormsby had studied medicine under his instruction, and that he was fully qualified to practice in that particular mode of the medical profession. By the way, it may be stated for the information of those who were not cotemporaneous with Ormsby's epoch in Greensburg, that before and after 1840 there lived and practiced medicine in Ohio a certain Dr. Dellen- bach, who had a great reputation for curing disease, and who was considered infallible in diagnosis. Every quack has his nostrum, and as Sangrado cured all diseases by warm water, so Dellenbach knew all dis- eases by the same element in a condition at second- hand. Dellenbach had as great a reputation for the discovery of disease as Dr. Braddee, of Uniontown, had for its cure until he grew tired of the petty larceny plunder of patients and entered upon the wholesale robbery of the United States.

Like all empirics, Ormsby made a great use of ad- vertising. His bills, with " UROBCOPIA" at the top in flaming letters, were found in nearly all bar-rooms and public places. They represented him to be a favorite pupil of the great Dellenbach, and stated that he had performed a number of wonderful cures, which were certifled to by reputable people, including ladies afflicted with sterility, and clergymen troubled with dyspepsia and derangement of the kidneys.

Ormsby opened an office in Main Street, in the centre of the town, for he was resolved not to hide his light under a bushel, and, besides, he was troubled with none of that mauvaise honte, that unlucky modesty or bashfulness which is often a stumbling- block in the road to fame and fortune. He had as much "modest assurance" as if he had been born in Dublin, lived in London, and served for seven years as a runner for a New York house.

It is well known that every quack has his nostrum, specific, panacea, or peculiar mode of treatment. The hobby of Ormsby was the discovery of disease by the urine. This has been a diagnostic since the days of

Hippocrates, and is used by all regular practitioners. But while the orthodox doctors use the urine only in certain cases, such as liver complaint, Ormeby and his school regarded it as the infallible symptom in all cases,-in itch, scrofula, sore eyes, corns, and rben- matism, as well as affections of the liver and kidneys. The diagnosis of disease by the urine has always been favorably regarded by the Germans and persons of German descent. Ormsby had located himself where there was a large number of substantial citisces of German origin. In addition, it may be said that when people are sick their judgment is unsettled; they run for relief to any quarter, and thus become the prey of bold charlatans and impudent impostors.

In despite, therefore, of the denunciations of the regular doctors, and the sneers and jeers of wags and blackguarda, Ormeby gained notoriety, and began to get business and make money.

He had some knowledge of the world, but very little book-learning. He could write a legible scrawl, and could read and spell about as well as many a member of the Legislature. Of the learned lan- guages . he knew nothing. Of ancient and modern history he knew so little that he would have been pussled to determine whether Alexander the Great was the ruler of Macedon or Muscovy. All that he knew of American history and politics was through the newspapers, and of these he knew just enough to have made a Fourth of July oration that would have passed current at a country cross-roads.

Yet still to sustain his professional dignity he pre- tended to all kinds of knowledge. A singular coles- tial body made its appearance, and invited the curi- osity of the gazing multitude. The learned world. unmuzzled its wisdom, and tried to explain the nature o the appearance in the heavens. Some said that it was a comet, others pronounced it to be a comated meteor, while a few of the philosophere held it to be nothing but an "irradiated nimbus." Ormsby was resolved not to be outdone in this display of learning, and so he wrote a learned article for the newspapers, in which he described the heavenly apparition and said that it was well known to the scientific world by the designation of "The Gray Mare's Tail." The learned laughed, but Ormaby was undaunted, and persisted so strongly in his asservations that many believed that in this case the gray mare was the better horse, and that Ormsby had the right end of the tale.

A physician of this county, as eminent for his ability as well known for his eccentricity and un- timely death, went to Philadelphia, and brought back with him a beautiful wooden instrument, named a stethoscope, used for the purpose of testing diseased lungs. Ormsby saw it and conceived a queer notion in his noddle. He went to a tinsmith and got a horn made about as long as that to be sounded by Gabriel. He rode into the country nearly every day with this engine strapped to the cantle of his saddle. On being

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asked the use, he replied that it was intended to test diseased lungs, that it was called a stethoscope, and was usually made of wood; but Dr. Dellenbach held the opinion that tin was the better material, because metal conveys sound more strongly and clearly. He said that he had it made about four times the usual length, because the longer an instrument the greater is its potency, as may be understood by the working of the lever !

One may well ask, Would one so ignorant of the profession pretend to administer medicine, and how did he manage without danger to life? The follow- ing was his mode of procedure. He had procured several blank-books, and in them he, or others for him, had written down the general symptoms of, and remedies for, nearly all ordinary diseases. Many of the recipes he had obtained from the books of other empirics, others by inquiries from nurses and old wo- men, and some by the examination of some old dis- pensatories. It is certain that he had never read a medical book. In fact, he did not know even the names of the best medical authors.

Of anatomy he knew nothing. He had never dis- sected a corpse nor seen one dissected. If asked upon which side the heart is situated, it is probable that he would have replied, with "The Mock Doctor" of Molière, "On the right side, of course." If the ques- tioner had doubted this assertion, and urged that the left side was the proper location of the heart, Ormsby had enough of readiness and impudence to have re- plied, "Ah! that was the location of the heart at one time, but it is now transferred to the right side. Nature must keep pace with the progress of medical science !"

The physicians of Westmoreland formed an asso- ciation for the advancement of medical science. From the association were excluded all who did not practice on the old regular system, or who could not show a diploma from a medical college. As Ormsby was excluded from the association he assailed it with great vigor. He tried to make the public believe that the association was formed to injure his reputation and destroy his practice. He was the Napoleon of medicine, against whom the Legitimists had formed a combination. One of the regular doctors replied to him in several sarcastic articles in the newspapers, but that did Ormsby some benefit, for it gave him no- toriety, and that was what he most eagerly desired. Some members of the medical association ascertained by inquiry in Ohio that Ormsby never had been a student of Dr. Dellenbach. Dellenbach gave them a letter to that effect, in which he stated that if Ormsby pretended to hold a certificate from him it must be a forgery. It was thought that this would silence and annihilate him, but instead of that it did him no harm. If Ormeby was nothing but a vile impostor and ignorant quack, why did these learned doctors take so much trouble to expose him ? If he cured his patients under a forged certificate, it was better than

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History of the County of Westmoreland, Pennsylvania, with Biographical Sketches of Many of its Pioneers and Prominent Men, Part 87

Author: George Dallas Albert, editor Publication date: Publisher: Number of Pages:

Author: George Dallas Albert, editor
Publication date:
Publisher:
Number of Pages: