USA > Tennessee > Davidson County > Nashville > History of Nashville, Tenn. > Part 56
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republished in the Nashville papers for the information of the people. Previous to the discovery of vaccination the mortality in London from small-pox was annually about two thousand persons, and the diminution of deaths from that cause was shown by the following statistics: In 1800 there died in London, from small-pox, 2,409 persons; in 1801, 1,461 ; in 1802, 1,319; in 1803, only 1,175; and in 1804, the small number of 568. The same results were shown to follow in other cities in England where vaccination had been resorted to. In Leeds the average number of deaths annually from small-pox previous to the introduction of this method of prevention was 328; in 1804 it sunk to 62. At Vienna the average number of deaths had been 835; in 1802 the number was only 61; in 1803, 27; in 1804, 2. At Lucknow, in the East Indies, the aver- age annual number of deaths had been 800; in three years after the in- troduction of vaccination the number had been decreased to 75. The same results followed so far as information could be obtained in every great town throughout the world. From Marseilles, from Geneva, from Paris, the small-pox had been extirpated. The natives of India said: " We no longer have Attila, the small-pox."
Several years elapsed before there was any trouble here from this dis- ease, and then that trouble was but very slight, and is mentioned later in these pages.
Dr. James Roane commenced the practice of medicine in Nashville as early as 1814, and he was long one of the leading physicians of the place not alone from his talents as a physician, but in part from his equanimity of temper and courtliness of manners. He was the son of Archibald Roane, second Governor of the State of Tennessee. His classical edu- cation was acquired at East Tennessee College, and his medical educa- tion in New York City. Dr. Roane was the first President of the Med- ical Society of Tennessee, in 1830, and his career of usefulness was cut short by cholera in 1833, when he fell a victim to his zeal in his profes- sion February 27 of that year.
Dr. Hadley came to Nashville toward the latter part of 1814, and on January 1, 1815, advertised in the public prints that he had recently re- moved to this place for the purpose of practicing the various branches of medical science.
Dr. Boyd McNairy was born in Nashville, and began the practice of his profession here in the early part of 1815. His office at that time was in the brick house formerly owned by Robert Stothart. He graduated in medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, and after beginning the practice of medicine soon acquired an enviable rank for the sterling worth of his professional and manly character. He was distinguished
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for sound judgment and decision of character, and continued in the prac- tice of medicine here until his death in 1859.
Dr. Dulany commenced the practice of medicine here in 1815 or 1816, and during the latter part of this year and the first part of 1817 was away on a tour of observation through the towns of Tennessee. He re- turned in May, and advertised that he would continue to practice on can- cers of every description, both occult and open; on wens or indolent tumors, on tetters, scald-heads, and scurvy, scrofula, venereal diseases, gouts, rheumatism, sciatica, and the first stages of consumption, female complaints and blindness, deafness and other complaints equally trouble- some and dangerous.
Mrs. Susanna Dulany was the first female dentist in the city. In May, 1817, she advertised as having lately come from the city of Baltimore, and that she was here to practice dentistry in all its branches. She drew teeth with skill and without much pain, made artificial teeth, cleaned teeth, plugged hollow ones, either with gold or lead, which not only put an end to the pain, but also preserved the teeth a great while, etc.
In May, 1817, Drs. McNairy and Shelby formed a partnership in the practice of medicine. Dr. John Shelby was a native of Sumner County, Tenn., born May 26, 1786. He received a good education, and gradu- ated in medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. In 1813 he joined the army as surgeon, and served under General Jackson in the Creek War. During the war he was so severely wounded as to lose an eye. Shelby Medical College was named in his honor. His death occurred in Nashville May 15, 1859.
Dr. Higginbotham began the practice of medicine in Nashville in Oc- tober, 1817.
On November 1, 1817, occurred, it was believed, the first case of small- pox that had ever been known in Nashville or its vicinity. This case was on board a boat in the Cumberland. Precautions were taken against its spread to the inhabitants of the town. Vaccination was urged upon the citizens as one of the means necessary to prevent its ravages, and no other case occurred at that time.
Dr. Adam Gibbs Goodlett began the practice of medicine in Nashville in October, 1817. He was a native of Virginia, having been born in Orange County, that State, in October, 1782. He began the study of medicine in Kentucky, and afterward pursued the study in Philadelphia under Dr. Rush, Dr. Barton, and other eminent physicians. He returned . to Lexington, Ky., and there continued the practice of his profession until the breaking out of the war of 1813-15, when he joined the army and was made surgeon of the Seventh Regiment of Infantry. After the
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close of the war he was sent on a special mission to Europe, and in 1817 settled in Nashville, where he practiced medicine until 1848, when he re- tired to a farm in Rutherford County, and there died suddenly of heart disease April 19 of that year. Dr. Goodlett was a prominent physician in his day, a man of strictly temperate habits, and was highly respected by all who knew him.
Dr. Samuel Hogg commenced the practice of medicine in Nashville about the Ist of June, 1819. . He was born in Caswell County, N. C., April 18, 1783. When prepared to practice medicine he came to Ten- nessee and settled first at a small village on the Cumberland, then went to Lebanon, and in 1812 accepted the position of surgeon to a regiment and was at the battle of New Orleans, January 8, 1815. He was after- ward sent to the State Legislature and to the Congress of the United States, and in 1840 was made President of the State Medical Society. Dr. Hogg was one of the most noted of the medical profession in the State, and died of consumption May 28, 1842, after a life well spent in doing good to all about him.
Dr. James Overton removed from Lexington, Ky., in October, 1819, and commenced the practice of medicine in Nashville at that time. He was born in Louisa County, Va., in August, 1785. He at first studied law; but abandoning the design of following that profession, he entered the office of the famous Dr. Rush, of Philadelphia, and was soon after- ward, through the influence of Henry Clay, elected Professor of Materia Medica during his lecture course in the Medical Department of Tran- sylvania University, at Lexington, Ky. He delivered one course of lect- ures, was transferred to the chair of practice, and resigned his position and as above narrated came to Nashville, where he followed the practice a short time, when he retired to a large plantation, and died near this city September 23, 1865.
On the 25th of April, 1821, Dr. Overton removed three stones from the bladder of a son of Mr. Condon, of this place, which was considered a remarkable operation at the time. In the early practice of medicine in Nashville and in the State at large there were a good many cases of this kind, and the early physicians were especially skillful in this line of sur- gery. On May 15, of the same year Dr. Felix Robertson performed the operation of removing a stone from the bladder of a Mr. Roland, who was twenty years of age. The stone was three and a half inches in its largest circumference and weighed one-half an ounce.
In 1820 and 1821 Drs. Robertson & Waters attended to dentistry in all its branches. They paid particular attention to transplanting sound, living teeth in place of those that were decayed.
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Dr. J. O. Ewing began the practice of medicine in Nashville in July, 1823. He said in his advertisement that in order to qualify himself for the practice of medicine he had devoted twelve years to the study of the classics and the science of medicine, the last three years more especially to familiarizing himself with the best modes of practice. He formed a partnership with A. G. Ewing under the firm name of J. O. & A. G. Ewing.
Dr. Hayes, in September, 1823, resumed the practice of that branch of medicine relating to midwifery in order to rescue it from the hands of the ignorant and presumptuous.
Dr. - - Yandell commenced the practice of medicine here in 1830. Dr. J. W. Bacon had been in practice here some time, and returned from Philadelphia in 1831, determined to follow his profession here. Dr. - - Esselman commenced the practice here in April, 1831, having his office with Dr. James Roane. Dr. J. R. Putnam, surgeon dentist, was then located on Summer Street, a few doors south of the Presbyterian church. Dr. M. Atchison was also at that time a surgeon dentist, having his office on Cherry Street. Dr. J. M. Cantrell began the practice of medicine here in October, 1831, and had his office with Dr. McNairy. Dr. William B. Dorris offered his professional services to the people of Nashville in May, 1832. Dr. Syd Smith began to practice here in June, 1832. Dr. J. H. Harris, dental surgeon, located here about the same time, and resided with Rev. Mr. Gwin. Dr. F. H. Badger was also en- gaged in the practice of dentistry at this time. In 1833 Dr. Becton was in partnership with Dr. McNairy.
In 1832 there was considerable anxiety and excitement with reference to the cholera. It had appeared at various places in the country, and it was well known to medical men that public and private cleanliness and temperate habits of living were essential to the prevention of the disease or to the mitigation of its severity in case preventive measures should fail. Hence in July of this year the subject of cleaning up the city be- gan to attract the attention of the authorities of the place. The neces- sity of removing the mass of filth which had been accumulating for years was urged upon the council through the public press, and the method that they were then pursuing was criticised for the reason that it was calculated to aggravate the difficulty instead of doing good. The accu- mulations of filth were being carted just outside the corporation limits, and there dumped and left to rot and fester in the heated rays of the sun, thus filling the air with the most offensive effluvia. It was thought that unless a change was made in this matter, the cholera upon reaching Nash- ville would find its work already done by a malignant fever or some other
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equally fatal disease. On the 14th of July there was a meeting of the council to consider what further measures, if any, were necessary relat- ing to the cholera. It was resolved that the commissioners appointed at a previous meeting be made permanent during the term of the board, and that they be required to inspect their respective wards at least twice each month. They were also required to make a full report to the board of all who failed to comply with the requisitions of the committee. The corporation hands were required to work on the streets and to clean the town of nuisances.
In connection with this subject the Board of Health submitted a report to the Mayor and Aldermen in September, 1832, they having appointed a committee to draft a system of rules respecting diet, which they wished to submit to the people for their guidance. The committee consisted of Drs. Boyd McNairy, James Roane, Samuel Hogg, J. L. Hadley, Felix Robertson, and James Overton. The report of this committee took ground against quarantine regulations as being ineffective and often in- jurious. They recommended that the city be thoroughly purified, includ- ing the streets, alleys, lanes, etc., and also the cellars of houses and business buildings. They latter they said should be made dry, and the floors covered with lime. They also recommended to all the citizens temperance, cleanliness, ventilation, wholesome food, and warm and sufficient clothing. They went into minute directions as to the articles of food which should be used and which should be avoided, and insisted upon the duty of all to make immediate report of all diseases of the stomach and bowels, to the Board of Health, with the view of the prompt application of the appropriate remedy.
On October 22, 1832, the Board of Health held a meeting at which a committee was appointed to draft such resolutions as were proper for the direction of those who might have charge of any one taken with the cholera previous to the attendance of a physician. Prevention, they said, was more valuable than cure. In order to prevent an attack of cholera they advised that no medicine be taken so long as a person was well; that no lax or disordered state of the stomach or bowels should be neglect- ed; that upon noticing the premonitory symptoms the patient should im- mediately bathe the feet and legs for half an hour in water as warm as it could be borne; remain in a warm room, drink warm mint, sage, or balm tea, and abstain from all food. If the attendance of the physician should be delayed more than an hour, or if the symptoms should be ur- gent, apply a large mustard plaster over the stomach and bowels, and give to a grown person two grains of calomel, rubbed down with a little brown sugar, or twenty or thirty drops of paregoric every half-hour for
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six hours, with a mild dose of castor oil an hour after the last powder. This course of treatment should be pursued until bilious or consistent discharges were produced. The Board also said that intemperate, disso- lute, or drunken persons were the favorite victims of cholera, and were the first to establish its epidemic existence, and that such persons should if practicable be removed from the city; and that all tippling houses, especially those accessible to the black population, should be promptly suppressed.
The report of the Board of Health on December 13, 1832, was to the effect that in the opinion of the board epidemic cholera had made its ap- pearance in Nashville within the past few days and that there had been three deaths from the disease. There was then a period of several weeks without any deaths from cholera; but on January 19, 1833, there were 10 cases and 6 deaths; on the 21st, 9 cases and 3 deaths; on the 22d, 5 cases and I death; on the 23d, 3 cases and no deaths; on the 24th, 3 cases and I death; on the 25th, I case and I death; on the 26th, 4 cases and 2 deaths; on the 27th, 2 cases and 2 deaths; on the 28th, 2 cases and no deaths. On February I there were 4 cases and I death; on the 2d, 3 cases and 2 deaths; on the 4th, 10 cases and 5 deaths; on the 5th, 4 cases and 2 deaths; and from this time on the disease assumed a milder form and soon disappeared.
In May, 1833, the cholera again made its appearance in Nashville. By the 8th of the month a few deaths occurred among the colored popula- tion. There was then a lapse of more than two weeks before any other cases occurred; but on the 28th of the month it appeared in a fatal form, twenty cases being reported, six or seven of which had terminated fatally. On the 29th there were seven or eight fatal cases and a good many new ones. On Friday, May 31, there were five burials ; on June I, 7; on the 2d, 4; on the 3d, 4; on the 4th, 4; the 5th, 2; and in all from the 28th of May up to and including June 7, 42; 21 whites and 21 blacks. On the 8th there was I; the 9th, 5; 10th, 6; 11th, 8; 12th, 2; 15th, 9; 17th, 8; and from this time on the number of deaths steadily diminished. Among the notable deaths during this period were those of Francis Porterfield, one of the most prominent merchants of the place, and Josiah Nichol, President of the Branch Bank of the United States, located in Nashville.
Toward the latter part of 1823 the necessity for a hospital began to be seriously felt in Nashville. To assist in the establishment of such an in- stitution the Legislature, on October 15, passed a law authorizing the drawing of a lottery. The town council of the city therefore, on the 28th of October, adopted a resolution favoring the conveying to the use of
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said proposed hospital a lot in the south field purchased of W. Barrow for the use of said hospital and for no other purpose. The managers of the lottery were Boyd McNairy, Felix Robertson, James Overton, and James Roane. The necessity for such an institution was set forth elo- quently and at great length by the Board of Managers. They said: "To justify the propriety of such an enterprise it will only be necessary to re- flect and to know that the sons and daughters of many a high-spirited emigrant, whose bones are still bleaching on the field of Indian conflict, pine and perish in the bosom of our country, the victims of want and bodily affliction. They are daily seen, haggard and wan in their aspect, begging a miserable and uncertain morsel of subsistence from house to house and from door to door in our streets or partially covered by loath- some tatters stretched upon the naked earth and exposed to the winter's piercing blasts, uttering their midnight and solitary supplications to the throne of grace and mercy. In comparison with these pitiful and blight- ed specimens of our species the condition of the meanest reptile that crawls in filth and the insensibility of inferior animation is dignified and desirable. They have their appetites and instincts to guide them and a bodily organization to sustain the station in nature which has been as- signed to them by the fiat of their Creator. Not so with man destitute of reason. His society is avoided by men and animals of a lower order, and he wanders a lost and destitute stranger in the midst of those feel- ings and motives which bind into society the multiform varieties of ani- mated nature, and which minister in turn to the preservation and felici- ties of their existence. It is for the sole purpose of collecting into a body and of providing some comfortable habitation for these peculiarly afflicted and unfortunate individuals of the human family that the profits of the lottery are to be employed by its managers."
The scheme of the lottery was as follows: One prize, $8,000; one prize, $4,000; one prize, $2,000; one prize, $1,000; two prizes, each $500; ten prizes, each $100; twenty prizes, each $50; one hundred and fifty prizes, each $20; nine hundred prizes, each $10; total, $30,- 000. The number of prizes was one thousand and eighty-six, and the number of blanks, one thousand nine hundred and fourteen.
The result of the drawing was not published, so far as could be learned, nor was the hospital built in accordance with the plans of its projectors. In fact, it is believed that the city of Nashville had no hospital of its own until the present year, 1890, the city's patients being cared for by one or the other of the two medical colleges upon contract with the city. A brief sketch of the present city hospital may be found in the chapter on "Public Institutions."
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Reference has been made to a few of the older physicians of the city, and additional sketches are here presented, though not of all that are worthy to be thus mentioned.
John Newnan, M.D., was one of the most distinguished physicians of Nashville from 1810 until his death in 1833. He was a native of Scot- land and a graduate of Edinburgh University. He was a man of marked peculiarities, but of strong abilities in his profession. John C. Newnan, M.D., son of John Newnan, was born in Nashville in 1818. He was a graduate of the Medical Department of the University of Louisville, and practiced his profession in this city for many years. He died in 1870.
Charles K. Winston, M.D., was a native of Kentucky, in which State he commenced the practice of medicine. He moved to Nashville in 1842, and until 1876, when his health failed, he was a leading physician. He filled the chair of materia medica and pharmacy in the Medical De- partment of the university for many years, and was a fine lecturer. John Dudley Winston was a native of Kentucky and a graduate of Transyl- vania University. He moved to Nashville in 1849, and was constantly engaged in practice until his death in 1873.
Thomas Reid Jennings, M.D., was a son of Rev. Obadiah Jennings, D.D., pastor of the First Presbyterian Church in Nashville. Dr. Jen- nings received his degree from the Medical Department of the University of Pennsylvania, and commenced the practice of medicine in Nashville in 1835. For thirty years he was the most prominent physician in the State. He was twice a member of the State Senate, and declined a nom- ination for Congress. He was a man of varied talents and accomplish- ments. In 1854 he was made Professor of Physiology in the Medical Department of the University of Nashville, and was afterward transferred to the chair of anatomy. He died in 1874, in the sixty-ninth year of his age.
A. H. Buchanan, M.D., was born in Virginia, was a graduate of the Medical Department of the University of Pennsylvania, practiced for many years in Columbia, Tenn., and moved to Nashville in 1842. He was one of the original faculty of the University of Nashville, filling the chair of physiology and surgical anatomy. He was a surgeon of distin- guished skill and a fine teacher. He died at Stone Mountain, Ga., June 20, 1863, a refugee from his home during the Civil War.
John P. Ford, M.D., was born in Cumberland County, Va., January 7, 1810, and was reared in Huntsville, Ala. He was a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, and practiced medicine in Alabama and Mississippi before removing to Nashville in 1842. Here he enjoyed a large practice and was much esteemed and beloved. He filled the chair
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of obstetrics and diseases of women and children in the Shelby Medical College of Nashville, now the Medical Department of Vanderbilt Uni- versity. He died in 1865.
R. K. C. Martin, M.D., was a native of Tennessee and a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania. He commenced the practice of medi- cine in 1833, and was one of the leading physicians in the city until his death in 1870. Robert Martin, M.D., was also a native of this State and for many years a prominent physician. He died in Knoxville in 1877. John Irwin, M.D., was for twenty years a practitioner in Nashville, and died in 1854.
John Shelby, M.D., was born in 1786 in Sumner County, Tenn. He was a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, and practiced in his native county before removing to Nashville in 1820. For many years be- fore his death in 1859 he had retired from practice, and from 1849 to 1853 was postmaster in this city.
John M. Watson, M.D., was a native of Tennessee, and before his re- moval to Nashville in 1851 was a leading practitioner in the adjoining counties of Rutherford and Williamson. He was a minister of the Old Baptist faith, and was very popular both as a physician and a minister. He was, until his death in 1865, Professor of Obstetrics and Diseases of Women and Children in the Medical Department of the University of Nashville from its founding in 1851.
William P. Jones, M.D., is a native of Kentucky. Previous to moving to Nashville in 1849 he practiced medicine in his native State. In 1862 he was made Superintendent of the Tennessee Hospital for the Insane, and held the position eight years. He was postmaster in this city from 1877 to 1885, and is connected with the Medical Department of the Uni- versity of Tennessee.
John D. Kelley, M.D., was a native of Kentucky, and practiced medi- cine in Nashville from 1837 to 1865. He was made collector of internal revenue for the northern district of Kentucky in 1866, and died in 1870.
G. A. J. Mayfield, M.D., was a native of Tennessee and a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania. He practiced medicine in Nashville from 1852 to 1864, when he died in the hospital service of the United States Government. S. D. Mayfield, M.D., was also a native of this State and a graduate of Transylvania University. He practiced medi- cine in this city from 1862 to 1870, and died in 1880.
W. A. Atchison, M.D., was a native of Kentucky and a graduate of the Medical Department of the University of Louisville. Long a prac- titioner at Bowling Green, he removed to Nashville in 1875, where he now resides engaged in successful practice.
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W. L. Nichol, M.D., was born in this city in 1828, and is a graduate of the University of Nashville and of the Medical Department of the Uni- versity of Pennsylvania. For several years he was a surgeon in the United States navy, and settled in practice in this city in 1854. He has filled several chairs in the Medical Department of the University of Nash- ville and Vanderbilt University, and is now Professor of the Practice of Medicine and Clinical Medicine.
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