The History of the Medical Department of Transylvania University

Chapter IV: Part 4

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Doctor Lawson continued to teach from this chair until the death of Professor J. P. Harrison, whom he succeeded in that of the Principles and Practice of Medicine and Clinical Medicine, in the same college in 1852. He was appointed Professor of the Theory and Practice of Medicine in the Kentucky School of Medicine in Louisville in 1854, but accepted a call to the same chair in the Medical College of Ohio, Cincinnati, in 1857. He filled the chair of Clinical Medicine in the University of Louisiana, New Orleans, in 1860, but returned in consequence of the Civil War to the Medical College of Ohio the following year, in which college he remained until his death, January 21, 1864.

He founded the _Western Lancet_, and was its sole editor and proprietor from 1842 up to the time of his decease. He also edited _Hope's Morbid Anatomy_, 1844, and published a treatise on the _Practical Treatment of Phthisis Pulmonalis_ in 1861.

Doctor Lawson was a lover of his profession and a most indefatigable worker and student. Remarkably lucid and impressive in his oral teachings, and methodical in his laborious professional and editorial occupations, he was a modest but self-possessed, undemonstrative gentleman of high probity and personal merit. The world at large did not fully appreciate his value, or that of his labors.

His daughter, Miss Louisa Lawson, studied sculpture as a profession, and as an artist is well known.

ETHELBERT LUDLOW DUDLEY, M. D.,

Nephew of the late distinguished surgeon, Benjamin W. Dudley, was his private pupil for many years. He graduated in the Medical Department of Transylvania University with distinguished honor in 1842, after having attended three full courses of instruction in that department. His first course of medical lectures was in the winter of 1838-39. It was the first session in which the present writer occupied the chair of Chemistry and Pharmacy, and well he remembers the assiduous attention of his pupil; his avidity in the acquisition of knowledge and his unusual ability to retain it. Distrusting yet his own attainments and desirous of more thorough training before taking upon himself the responsible and arduous offices of a practitioner, he, under the immediate charge of his uncle, then in active practice, attended two other full courses of medical lectures (sessions 1842-43 and 1843-44) as resident graduate. During this period he sometimes officiated as prosector to his distinguished kinsman.[92]

From a Photograph.]

Before the next following session, Doctor Ethelbert L. Dudley was appointed Demonstrator of Anatomy in the place of Doctor James M. Bush, who had been promoted to the chair of Anatomy. This responsible office he filled until called to the chair of General and Pathological Anatomy in 1847-48.

From the origin of this medical school Professor Benjamin W. Dudley had taught in the combined chair of Anatomy and Surgery, blending the two in a manner most instructive and practical.[93] In 1837, he accepted Doctor James M. Bush as adjunct to the combined professorship, and in 1844, Doctor Bush having been appointed Professor of Anatomy, the elder Dudley restricted himself to the chair of the Principles of Surgery.

In the summer of 1846, Doctor Ethelbert L. Dudley was appointed to deliver a course of lectures on Comparative Anatomy. This duty he performed to the highest satisfaction of all concerned; and when, almost at the beginning of the next regular session (1847-48), he was called to the chair of Anatomy and Physiology, he successfully encountered the great labor of preparing and delivering a new course of lectures on these subjects. At the same time he also discharged the arduous duties of Demonstrator of Anatomy--duties more onerous in this school, in our small inland city, than in most other medical colleges. No one in the whole school accomplished half the work which he mastered. No task seemed too great for his young and ardent energies.

In 1849, he originated and took upon himself the sole charge as editor of the _Transylvania Medical Journal_, a new series of the old _Transylvania Journal of Medicine_. He published three volumes in three successive years, aided only occasionally by some of his colleagues. In the spring of 1850, he visited Europe for professional improvement, making many friends; amongst the distinguished medical men of England particularly. Immediately on his return from Europe, in the autumn of that year, the present writer announced to him, in the city of New York, his appointment to the chair of Descriptive Anatomy and Histology in the Kentucky School of Medicine. This was a new school which some of the physicians of Louisville and professors of the Lexington school were about to establish in the former city, to which place students of medicine from the South and West were beginning to flock, to the neglect somewhat of the time-honored Transylvania school, in which it was proposed to continue medical instruction in summer sessions.

This appointment he accepted, joining in the preliminary October course of lectures and aiding greatly by his talents and energy in building up that institution. Transferred in the following year to the chair of Surgery in the Transylvania summer school, on the retirement of his uncle from active professional life, he continued to teach with distinguished ability in the position made illustrious by his predecessor, until the close of the school shortly before the outbreak of our Civil War.

In the second year of the Kentucky School of Medicine, he was transferred to the chair of Surgical Anatomy and Operative Surgery, and accordingly gave the surgical-clinical instruction in the Marine Hospital of Louisville to the combined classes of the two medical schools of that city during the session of 1851-52. A course which was a decided success for the young professor and surgeon, and which helped to place him at once on the elevated position as a professional man and a gentleman which he maintained to the day of his death and to which few men, of his age especially, ever are fortunate enough to attain.[94]

After another successful session in this school he, with the other Transylvania professors, resigned and returned permanently to Lexington, resuming his practice there and his duties in the renewed winter sessions of the Transylvania Medical Department.

As a practitioner, especially of surgery, Doctor E. L. Dudley always commanded the highest respect and admiration of his colleagues as well as the confidence and affections of his patients. Singularly unselfish and always willing to devote himself fully to his profession, his patients and his friends, few men had the power so quickly and so firmly to bind others to him with the ties of affection.

With nerves as of steel, clear eye, quick judgment and answering hand, combined with the kind feelings of a woman and a fullness of professional knowledge rarely surpassed, his short career as a surgeon--all too brief!--was yet a brilliant one. Had his life been spared to him the name of Dudley had achieved a yet higher distinction in the annals of surgery.

At the outbreak of our Civil War, Doctor Dudley's loyal attachment to the nation and his love of country caused him to take an active part against the rebellion. While the fate of Kentucky hung yet in the balance of a professed neutrality, he was actively instrumental in organizing a battalion of "Home Guards," of which he was at once appointed Commandant--an organization which greatly helped to prevent the precipitation of our State into the war for secession.[95]

Obtaining authority to organize a regiment of volunteers for active service, of which he was Colonel, preferring this active position to the less belligerent one of Medical Director which was proffered him, he left Lexington with his command for the southern part of the State. There, exhausted by the continued labors and exposures of his combined offices of colonel, surgeon and physician to his men (which he would not commit to another), he fell a victim to typhoid fever on February 20, 1862, at the age of forty-four. His remains, brought to Lexington, were received with public honors and were followed to the cemetery by a long procession of sorrowing friends.

SAMUEL ANNAN, M. D.,

Was born at Philadelphia, Pa., in the year 1800--a descendant of Scotch ancestors. He graduated as M. D. at the Edinburgh University in 1820. His thesis, entitled _De Appoplexia Sanguinia_, is in the library of the Medical and Surgical Faculty of Maryland. He was licentiate of the Medical and Chirurgical Faculty of Maryland in 1822, being then ex-President of the Royal Physical Society of Edinburgh.

From 1827 to 1834, he ably occupied the chair of Anatomy and Physiology in the Medical Department of Washington University at Baltimore, Maryland. From 1838 to 1845, he was physician to the Baltimore Alms-house. In 1846, he was called to the chair of Obstetrics and Diseases of Women and Children in the Medical Department of Transylvania University, a position which he occupied with great ability until, in 1849, he was transferred to the chair of Theory and Practice of Medicine in the same institution, in which he gave general satisfaction until 1854, when he resigned that position.

During the years 1853-57, he was Superintendent to the Insane Asylum at Hopkinsville, Kentucky. He became surgeon to the Confederate States Army at the outbreak of our Civil War in 1861, maintaining that position until 1864. In 1866, he was surgeon to the steamship "Carroll" of the Liverpool line, from April to November. He died at Baltimore, January 19, 1868.

Doctor Annan was a person of great activity of mind and body, of high intelligence and probity of character. In the course of his active life and practice in his profession he found time to contribute many valuable articles to the medical journals, of which we quote the following, viz:

"Cases of Bronchotomy." Maryland Medical Recorder, Vol. VII, p. 42. 1823.

"On the Surgical Anatomy of Hernia." Ibid., Vol. III, p. 529. 1829.

"On Polypus Nasi." Ibid., No. 3, p. 655. 1830.

"On the Use of Wine in Fevers." Ibid., p. 279. 1831.

"Address to the Graduates of Washington University." 1834.

"New Views of Certain Dislocations." American Journal of Medical Science, Vol. XVIII, p. 376. 1836.

"On the Treatment of Prolapsus Ani." Ibid., p. 334. 1836.

"On Spinal Irritation and Inflammation." Ibid., Vol. XX, p. 85. 1837.

"On Cases in the Baltimore Alms-house." Ibid., Vol. XXII, p. 378. 1838.

"On Wind Contusions." American Medical Journal, Vol. II, pp. 3, 133, and 213. 1838.

"On Cases in the Baltimore Alms-house." Journal of Medical Science, Vol. XXIV, p. 316; and Journal of Medical Science, Vol. XXV, p. 32. 1839.

"On Cases in the Baltimore Alms-house." Medical and Surgical Journal, pp. 322 and 338. 1840.

"Lecture at Opening of Kentucky School of Medicine." 1850.

"On Fracture of the Skull." American Medical Record, No. 3, Vol. II, p. 449.

"Case of Laceration of the Ileum from External Injury." American Journal of Medical Science, p. 287. 1838.

For most of the facts contained in this brief sketch of the active life of Doctor Annan we are indebted to the kindness of Doctor Oscar J. Coskery, of Baltimore.

NOTE.--In 1850, Doctor Annan accepted the chair of Pathology and Practice of Medicine in the new Kentucky School of Medicine in Louisville, which position he occupied for two years with great ability, when he resigned to return to his native city.

In 1849, when Doctor Annan was transferred to the chair of Theory and Practice, the chair of Obstetrics was filled by Doctor William M. Boling, of Montgomery, Alabama, for one session. Doctor Boling had taught in the Memphis Medical School of Tennessee, and was "favorably known in the South as a good practitioner, an able medical writer, and an excellent teacher."

PROFESSOR HENRY M. BULLITT

Occupied the chair of Materia Medica and Medical Botany with ability during the session of 1849-50, after which, with the aid of some of his Transylvania associates, he established the "Kentucky School of Medicine," which still maintains a prosperous condition.

"Doctor Bullitt commenced the study of medicine at seventeen years of age, in the office of Doctor Coleman Rogers, senior, of Louisville, entering the Medical Department of the University of Pennsylvania as a pupil, and graduating with high honor in 1838. Returning to Louisville, he began the practice of medicine in partnership with Doctor Joshua B. Flint, thus continuing for many years, their office being the headquarters of the prominent physicians of this city.

"Doctor Bullitt passed the year 1845 in Europe, where he took advantage of every opportunity of advancing in medical knowledge. He returned liberally equipped with the good fruits of his sojourn abroad. In 1846, he was elected a professor in the St. Louis Medical College and lectured there in 1846-47 and 1847-48. In 1849, he was elected to the chair of Materia Medica, etc., in Transylvania University.... In 1850, he was mainly instrumental in the establishment of the Kentucky School of Medicine in Louisville, aided by 'prominent members of the Faculty of Transylvania.'

"In 1866, he was elected to the chair of Theory and Practice in the University of Louisville, and, in 1867, was transferred to that of Physiology. In 1868, he established the Louisville Medical College, with which he remained during the several years of his professional life, his increasing deafness greatly marring his social and professional enjoyments.

"Doctor Bullitt was an able writer on professional subjects.... He held, successively, chairs in five medical schools," in all with great ability.

"In 1866, he was elected Health Officer of the city of Louisville," which office he most ably filled.... "Doctor Bullitt was one of the ablest Health Officers the city ever possessed," and was author of many papers of "great merit in numerous medical journals. His great affliction, deafness, was all that prevented him from taking the foremost position among medical practitioners, teachers, and writers. But he bore the misfortune with singular equanimity and fortitude."

Doctor Bullitt died on the seventh of January, 1880, after a number of weeks' confinement to his bed with Bright's disease.

* * * * *

The greater part of this brief sketch of the life of Doctor Bullitt is copied from an able obituary notice published in the _Louisville Journal_ at the time of his death.

HENRY MARTYN SKILLMAN, M. D.,

Youngest child of Thomas T. and Elizabeth Farrar Skillman, born September 4, 1824, at Lexington, Kentucky, was educated in Transylvania University. He spent two or three years in the drug and apothecary business in Lexington, and commenced the study of medicine and surgery in 1844, graduating as Doctor of Medicine, etc., in 1847. He was appointed Demonstrator of Anatomy in the Medical Department of Transylvania University in 1848. In 1851, he was appointed Professor of General and Pathological Anatomy and Physiology, which position he occupied with skill and success until the close of the Medical College in 1857. Since that time he has devoted himself to the duties of his profession in medicine and surgery, being "one of the most skillful, successful, and accomplished physicians in Kentucky," and "having inherited the admirable qualities of his parents, is one of the most honorable and useful citizens of Lexington."[96]

Since the above was written, the gentle and busy life of this last surviving member of the Transylvania Medical Faculty came suddenly to a close at his home in Lexington, March 21, 1902, at a quarter past four o'clock in the afternoon, apparently without warning. Only two hours previously, handsome and smiling and dignified as usual, he had visited a patient, and he expected in a few hours to resume his professional rounds when the last summons came.

From a Photograph by Mullen.]

It is hardly possible for a man to depart this life without leaving an enemy, but if Doctor Skillman, in his fifty-four years of active professional life, had made even a few enemies they hesitated to declare themselves. His own nature was to see good in others; their defects were not made prominent by him. As he spoke no evil, so nothing but good was said of him. But with his amiable, benevolent, compromising disposition there was no trace of weakness. Strict in professional etiquette, immovable in principle, he repelled with gentle but irresistible firmness every effort to shake his integrity. The loveliness of his character and personality is best portrayed in "Luke, the Beloved Physician," a tribute paid, on his death, editorially in the _Lexington Herald_ by Kentucky's favorite orator and statesman, every word of which is as true as it is well-chosen and beautiful. Doctor Skillman held numerous offices of trust; was elected, in 1869, President of Kentucky State Medical Society and, in 1889, the first President of Lexington and Fayette County Medical Society, and was at the time of his death the oldest practicing physician in Lexington, having seen that city grow from eight thousand to thirty thousand inhabitants. It is claimed that he was the first physician to administer chloroform there. For two years during the Civil War he was contract surgeon for the Government.

Doctor Skillman's father, Thomas T. Skillman, a native of New Jersey, came to Lexington in 1809, and soon founded there the largest publishing house in the Mississippi Valley, the name of T. T. Skillman on the title page of a work being a guarantee of its excellence and fitness for the family circle. In 1823, an edition of several thousand copies of the entire Bible was published by Mr. Skillman from stereotype plates sent from New York by the American Bible Society. He founded the _Evangelical Recorder and Western Review_, afterward edited by Reverend John Breckinridge, the young and talented pastor of "the McChord Church"; also the _Western Luminary_, in 1824, the first religious paper issued in the West.

Doctor Skillman married, October 30, 1851, Margaret, daughter of Matthew T. Scott, President of the Northern Bank of Kentucky. Of their children only one is living, Henry Martyn Skillman, of the Lexington Security Trust and Safety Vault Company.

SAMUEL M. LETCHER, M. D.,

Of a prominent Kentucky family, also a graduate of the Medical Department of Transylvania University who had won distinction in his profession in Lexington, was called to the chair of Professor of Obstetrics and Diseases of Women and Children in that school in 1851, and performed the duties of that chair with ability and success until the close of the Medical College in Lexington in 1857. During the Civil War he was placed in charge of a United States General Hospital in Lexington, a position which he held for some time, giving great satisfaction. He died February 1, 1863, in Lexington, Kentucky.

JOHN ROWAN ALLEN, M. D.,

Who was Superintendent of the Eastern Lunatic Asylum at Lexington,[97] Kentucky, and who first introduced there the moral treatment of the insane instead of forcible means, was appointed Professor of Materia Medica and Botany in 1851, and performed the duties of this chair with great ability until the end of the session of 1855, when he resigned that position.

DOCTOR WILLIAM STOUT CHIPLEY

Was born in Lexington, Kentucky, October 18, 1810, the only son of Reverend Stephen and Amelia Stout Chipley, the forefathers of both of whom were pioneers of Lexington. Doctor Chipley was graduated at Transylvania in 1832, with marked honor. Not a great while after his graduation he took issue with Doctor Benjamin Dudley, the oldest and most renowned practitioner of the State--or indeed of the whole country. Doctor Dudley had published a treatise upon the treatment of a special disease. Doctor Chipley took an opposite view, expressing himself most boldly and brilliantly. His article was published in an advanced medical journal and copied widely. Chipley received widespread encomiums. Indeed, he came off with raised banner, and his colors have never since been furled. His success was progressive this article exemplifying his determination when convinced he was right. Later he went to Columbus, Georgia, feeling assured it was a fine opening for a young practitioner, and so it proved. He was soon launched into an almost phenomenal practice, extending across the Chattahoochee River into Alabama to the Indian nation, where his wonderful magnetism was felt to such a degree that he won the confidence--even friendship--of these savages. He would be detained days at a time ministering to them--a tribe, too, by no means regarded as friendly to the whites. In April, 1837, he married in Columbus, Georgia, Elizabeth Fanning, niece and adopted daughter of Colonel James Fanning, of Alamo fame. Doctor Chipley was at one time Mayor of Columbus, and made a brilliant reputation as an executive officer. At the entreaties of his mother and father, who were quite advanced in age, he turned a deaf ear to the opposition of his legion of friends in Columbus and returned to Lexington, Kentucky, where it seemed a flourishing practice did but await him. He was a very successful Professor of Transylvania in the chair of Theory and Practice of Medicine, from 1854 to 1857, inclusive. As a lecturer he had a wonderful flow of language. The possessor of a perfect voice and delivery, he chained the attention of all listeners. Often have I heard his patients say his sunshiny presence, his gentle, sympathetic touch in the sick-room, dulled pain and was better than drugs. He was a brilliant and forceful writer, the author of many medical works and the writer of numerous articles published in medical journals of the highest note. One small book of his gave him much notoriety. Chief Justice George Robertson, of Lexington, regarded it of such high worth that he gave fifteen hundred dollars to have it published and placed as a healthful guide in certain schools for boys. It was in 1855 that he took charge of the Eastern Kentucky Lunatic Asylum at Lexington. This proved a wide field for the development of the most astonishing tact and management of individuals. The attendants greatly admired him and yielded without question to his dictation. Gentle as a woman, adamantine after a decision, never acting hastily, maturing a subject before deciding--these characteristics were shown on all occasions where it pertained to the comfort of the poor creatures under his care. During his fifteen or sixteen years of most successful management of this institution, he made many radical changes for the amelioration of the condition of these unfortunates. Winter after winter he haunted the legislative halls in behalf of the Asylum, spending his own personal means most lavishly to meet this end--presenting one bill after another, which sooner or later were always honored. His enthusiasm and faithfulness carried conviction with them. When he took charge of the Asylum he found it a conglomerate mass--many from other States there--incurables, epileptics, idiots--all huddled together. He went carefully over the records and proceeded to institute a thorough weeding. First he notified the governors of the respective States to send for their own insane, giving them a stated time of grace, and telling them that if the call was not honored he would send the patients to their doors by one of his own attendants, which he did in several instances. This systematizing was a great step forward. The next thing he did was to induce the State to erect an institution for idiots, believing there were few born who were not capable of receiving some degree of cultivation. In time a home was built at Frankfort, the result proving his great wisdom. It was a matter of wonderment to see these poor creatures developing from a driveling state of nonentity into some capacity for the enjoyment of life, and even to a degree of usefulness. There were but few incapable of being taught some employment which rendered their life more than a mere existence, akin alone to the lower animals. To have succeeded in this was enough to mark any man's life. His philanthropy never slept. Then, through his direct intervention, the Asylum at Anchorage for incurables was erected; all these changes making room for those who stood a chance of being cured instead of their being turned, for the lack of room, from the sheltering care which might restore them. I think his influence was brought to bear upon the advisability of an institution for the deaf and dumb, which culminated in the home made for them in Danville. I think it was in or about the year 1857 he went to Europe, absolutely for the purpose of gaining an insight into better ways and means of the treatment of the insane and the construction of the buildings which were their homes. Though there was such an emptying of the old Eastern Kentucky Lunatic Asylum building, it soon became altogether insufficient to meet the demands. Applications poured in, and soon, after a hard-fought battle, the legislature made an appropriation to add to the old building, and promptly there was under construction a building which, when finished, for comfort and in a sanitary way was unequaled. This, years after his death, was destroyed by fire, and when rebuilt, I understand, was modeled after the old plan. He was his own architect, his whole heart and being merged in a desire to have all as nearly perfect as possible, developing thus a new talent. He always had in view a private asylum of his own. This purpose was crystallized when it became apparent that politics would govern the State institutions, though in opposition to all that was humane. He resigned December, 1869. He purchased "Duncannon," the beautiful Duncan home near Lexington. The site selected, lumber on the place, all plans formulated, having gained such advanced ideas from his long and successful experience he hoped to have an ideal shelter for those who preferred private treatment. On December 9, 1871, at eleven o'clock at night, snow on the ground, standing with his family and several whom even then he had under his charge around him, after barely escaping with their lives, he saw the "Duncannon" mansion reduced to ashes. This disaster crippled his efforts to the degree that he was forced to forego that which if carried through would have proven a monument to his memory of no small magnitude. He then rented a house in Lexington, where he had some patients under his charge, with a private attendant who had won many laurels in this capacity. Doctor Chipley was frequently called upon, even in other States, to decide in the courts as a specialist in insanity. He had a great number under his private treatment in their own homes, of whom the world never knew. He had innumerable offers of positions, but none seemed to appeal to him so much as one at College Hill, near Cincinnati, Ohio. He accepted this offer. His success here proved a very decided one, redeeming the institution from great financial stress and opening up astonishing possibilities. He had four sons--only one now living (1903)--and one daughter (the present writer). He left many friends in Lexington who were ever beckoning him back, and to the last he hoped to return where his heart was. But after only a few years of service at College Hill he contracted a cold from which he never recovered. He died February 11, 1880. Invitations had been issued for a reunion in honor of his aged mother, who was ninety-seven the day he died. A train was to be chartered and Lexington friends were to come. He has left a memory of his gathered laurels and honored name more precious than the gems of the universe.

EMILY CHIPLEY JONES.

DOCTOR JAMES MORRISON BRUCE

Was a son[98] of John Bruce, a Scottish gentleman associated with Colonel James Morrison and Benjamin Gratz in the manufacture of hemp at Lexington, Kentucky, and was born at that place in 1822. After completing a collegiate education, he studied medicine with Doctor Benjamin W. Dudley, taking the degree of M. D. in Transylvania in 1843. He then spent three years in France, studying in the principal hospitals at Paris under the most eminent instructors. In 1846, he returned to Lexington to begin the practice of his profession. He was elected to the chair of Demonstrator of Anatomy in Transylvania Medical Department in 1850, continuing therein until the cessation of the school in 1857. Doctor Bruce's intrinsic merit was fully appreciated by his colleagues, who had great affection for him, but his excessively shrinking nature withheld him from taking the prominent position with the public to which his ability and learning entitled him. In truth, his chief characteristic was his modest, amiable, and retiring disposition. His specialty in medicine was eruptive disease. In the treatment of smallpox his professional brethren conceded him the highest place. For many years he was continuously elected City Physician, and holding this office he died, January 31, 1881, the sudden ending of his useful and kindly life being largely due to the exposure he so constantly and bravely encountered in his visits to the suffering poor during an unusually severe and trying winter. Says a fellow-physician,[99] "It was then that the great and good qualities of our friend and co-laborer, Doctor Bruce, shone pre-eminently. It was at a time when poverty and distress appealed to him that his great-heartedness, his forgetfulness of self, and his proficient medical skill forced itself before that public attention from which at all other times it timidly shrunk." Doctor Bruce married, in 1847, Miss Elizabeth Norton. Of his children Miss Elizabeth Bruce and Mrs. Charlotte B. Davis, of Lexington, survive him.

DOCTOR ALEXANDER KEITH MARSHALL,

Born February 11, 1808, performed the duties of the chair of Materia Medica in 1856. He had received a classical education from his father, the celebrated Doctor Louis Marshall, of "Buck Pond"; studied medicine with Doctor Ephraim McDowell, and completed his medical course at Transylvania. He was a handsome man, a forcible speaker, a prominent politician and Odd Fellow, and a member of Congress in 1855. He died at the home of his son, Louis, near Lexington, April, 28, 1884.[100]

BENJAMIN P. DRAKE, M. D.,

A graduate of Transylvania Medical Department in 1830, occupied the chair of Materia Medica in the last year of the school in 1857.

* * * * *

During the last two years of the Medical Department of Transylvania University the Faculty were:

Ethelbert L. Dudley, Surgery.

James M. Bush, Anatomy.

William S. Chipley, Theory and Practice.

Samuel M. Letcher, Obstetrics, etc.

Henry M. Skillman, Physiology and Institutes of Medicine.

Alexander K. Marshall, Materia Medica and Botany, 1856.

Benjamin P. Drake, Materia Medica and Botany, 1857.

Robert Peter, Chemistry and Pharmacy; Dean.

Built in 1839--Burned in 1863.]

From 1850 until the end in 1857, the existence of the school seems to have been an heroic struggle against fate. In spite of the fine Medical Hall, alluded to on the day of its dedication (November 2, 1840) by President Robert Davidson,[101] as "colossal in size and surpassing in architectural beauty," in spite of liberal endowments and "costly and complete apparatus, superior to any in the valley of the Mississippi, and not surpassed, if equaled, by any on the continent,"[102] the school languished. Notwithstanding the efforts of zealous Trustees and generous citizens, notwithstanding the diligence of an able Faculty, the classes steadily decreased from year to year until, in 1857, with only nine graduates, the Faculty in despair disbanded, and the time-honored Medical Department of Transylvania University was no more.

Two factors more than all else (except as before mentioned, the impossibility of securing sufficient material for clinical instruction) had contributed to its demise--the retirement of Doctor Dudley in 1850, and the difficulty that existed in establishing the needed railroads throughout the State. The latter cause had been operating unfavorably and with increasing effect almost ever since the introduction of steam transportation.

Enlightened thinkers had early recognized and urged the vital importance of railroads for Kentucky, and especially for Lexington and Transylvania, and had bravely advanced to conquer the difficulties of the situation, but with only discouragement and pecuniary loss for many years. The peculiar topography of the State, the constant alternation of hill and valley, the numerous streams, the hardness of the rock to be penetrated, made the building of railways very expensive, and capital was wanting. The wealth of Central Kentucky was in the soil, not in the purse, and without communication with the markets of the world this wealth was unavailable. In this manner enterprise was checked and Lexington sank into an apathetic state. It is true she had secured the distinction of having the first railroad in the West and the second in the United States,[103] but for years it only led to Frankfort, an interior town but twenty-eight miles distant. It was not until 1851 that it connected with Louisville.

Of Doctor Dudley's influence upon the medical school Doctor David W. Yandell truly says:[104] "The history of the Medical Department of Transylvania University--its rise, its success, its decline, its disappearance from the list of medical colleges--would practically cover Doctor Dudley's career, and would form a most interesting chapter in the development of medical teaching in the Southwest. But it must suffice me here to say that Doctor Dudley created the medical department of the institution and directed its policy. Its students regarded him from the beginning as the foremost man in the Faculty. That he had colleagues whose mental endowments were superior to his he himself at all times freely admitted. He is said to have laid no claim to either oratorical power or professional erudition. He was not a logician, he was not brilliant, and his deliverances were spiced with neither humor nor wit. And yet, says one of his biographers, in ability to enchain the students' attention, to impress them with the value of his instructions and his greatness as a teacher, he bore off the palm from all the gifted men who at various periods taught at his side."

But although these two would appear to be the more obvious reasons for the decline of the Medical Department of Transylvania, we can by no means ignore the injurious effect of rival medical colleges growing up at points more accessible and more progressive than Lexington could possibly be without rapid transit of some sort to make her own peculiar advantages available. Nor can we overlook the evil consequences of the opposition systematically shown to the Transylvania Medical School by the faction originating in the attempt to disorganize the institution in 1837.

However, in reviewing all these influences, the prosperity of Lexington to-day (1904), her rapid growth, her increasing enterprise, her vigorous trade, the flourishing condition of her colleges and seminaries--all of which has come to her since the completion of the railroads centering in her--abundantly prove that this communication, above everything else, was her indispensable requirement.

While the medical school was closed in 1857, the Academical Department of Transylvania University continued to be conducted at the Morrison College as a State Normal School,[105] under the Presidency of the distinguished Doctor Lewis W. Green, D. D., but was soon to be disorganized, after only two years of usefulness, on account of a supposed unconstitutionality. Thus Transylvania was again humbled to a low estate in educational distinction. Lexington herself was suffering an era of banishment, as we may say, for without proper railroad connections she was excluded from progress and rendered inaccessible to both labor and capital. The financial prosperity of her citizens was not such as to warrant the lavish hospitality formerly shown to strangers within her gates, and especially to the students in Transylvania. The enterprising individuals who remained to her were not sufficient in numbers to dispel by their most strenuous exertions the lethargy which had fallen upon the place.

Such was the state of affairs immediately preceding the Civil War. The immense Medical Hall had reverted to the city and was deserted, save the laboratory in which was still being busily conducted the chemical work of the first Geological Survey of Kentucky; and save perhaps one of the smaller rooms, rented to a lodger. The survey had just received a sudden check in the death of the lamented Doctor Owen when the war still further darkened the prospect, during which, as a matter of course, the resumption of the survey was out of the question. The Morrison College was almost immediately appropriated by the United States Government for a general hospital, and, some time after, the Medical Hall, which as before mentioned was utterly destroyed by fire[106] during its occupation by the sick soldiers. The conflagration originated, it appeared, from a defective flue of a temporary frame kitchen, built adjoining.[107]

The corner-stone of this Medical Hall had been laid July 4, 1839; Robert Wickliffe, junior, the well-beloved, making the address. It was dedicated November 2, 1840. Of Grecian architecture, massive and without ornamentation, it contained three great lecture rooms, with ample provision for light and ventilation. The amphitheatre was immediately below the cupola, being by this means lighted from above. There were three other large apartments--for the library, the anatomical museum, and for other medical teaching. Smaller rooms accommodated the laboratory, Faculty room, janitor's room, etc. Besides which were long halls or galleries utilized for natural history collections, museums of zoology, ornithology, geology, etc., as also for apparatus of divers sorts. The costly and complete chemical apparatus was well displayed and conveniently arranged in the immense lecture room for that department.

For many years Janitor at the Medical Hall of Transylvania University.]

In the spacious lecture-room in the front of the building many fashionable and distinguished audiences had assembled on various occasions, not only to hear the gifted incumbent professors in due discourse of introductory or valedictory, but to be charmed with concerts by Ole Bull, Strakosch, Adelina Patti--who sang there on her first tour in this country--and other celebrities of the period. There the learned Guyot had instructed in geology; there unique "Tom Marshall" had uniquely delivered a unique course of lectures on History. Over the rostrum hung the portrait of Doctor Samuel Brown--the first medical professor. This lecture hall was lighted for evening assemblages, from the sides mostly, by "scounches," as they were called by the "ole Virginny" negro janitor. This factotum, "Absolom Driver," is unforgotten by any whose path some time ran parallel with his. For many years the keeper of the Medical Hall, his zeal and vigilance were unimpeachable, his dignified solemnity on state occasions unsurpassed. Contemptuous of letters--except for doctors--and with unshakable prejudice against "book learnin' for niggers," he was faithful in trusts with the matchless fidelity of the dog. "Bad boys"--the problem of philosophers and ordinary folk in all ages--was one of easy solution by "Uncle Absolom" with a bent nail at the end of a long pole. Charged upon with _elan_ with this unprecedented weapon, accompanied by an ominous war-cry, no truant could withstand, even though the artfully strewn broken bottles on the high back fence had been successfully outflanked. "Robbers" had their everlasting antidote at hand in the peculiarly uncanny, long, "one-barreled shotgun" with curious lock, which stood in the corner of the Faculty room. Nobody ever heard it "go off," but the mystery of it was what appalled one. Happily "Uncle Absolom's" death was nearly coeval with the closing of the medical school. To have witnessed the burning of his sacred temple, the Medical Hall, after all his "keer," would have broken his heart indeed.

And now, bidding adieu to the shades of the grand old Transylvania Medical Department, conjured from the past by one now numbered with them, may the earnest wish be permitted with hope of realization, that some other hand with cunning in such craft will unveil to us the portraits of that bygone throng of brilliant men which constituted and which were the exponents of the honored Transylvania Law School.

APPENDIX

SCHEDULE A.

SUCCESSION OF THE MEDICAL PROFESSORS IN THE MEDICAL DEPARTMENT OF TRANSYLVANIA UNIVERSITY, FROM 1799 TO 1857, INCLUSIVE.

-------------------------------------------------------------------
-----+--------------------+-------------+------------+------------+
| | |Theory and |Institutes, | |
Year.|Surgery.| Anatomy. |Practice of |Physiology, |Obstretics, |
| | |Medicine. | etc. | etc. |
-----+--------------------+-------------+------------+------------+
1799 | Samuel | Samuel | Fred'ck | | Fred'ck |
| Brown | Brown | Ridgely | | Ridgely |
1805 | | | James | | |
| | | Fishback | | |
1809 | B. W. | B. W. | James |J. Buchanan | |
| Dudley | Dudley | Overton | | |
1815 | " | " | " | | W. H. |
| | | | |Richardson |
1817 | " | " | | | " |
1818 | " | " | " | | " |
1819 | " | " |Saumel Brown | Chas. | " |
| | | | Caldwell | |
1820 | " | " | " | " | " |
1821 | " | " | " | " | " |
1822 | " | " | " | " | " |
1823 | " | " | " | " | " |
1824 | " | " | " | " | " |
1825 | " | " |Daniel Drake | " | " |
1826 | " | " | " | " | " |
1827 | " | " | J. E. Cooke | " | " |
1828 | " | " | " | " | " |
1829 | " | " | " | " | " |
1830 | " | " | " | " | " |
1831 | " | " | " | " | " |
| | | | | |
1832 | " | " | " | " | " |
1833 | " | " | " | " | " |
1834 | " | " | " | " | " |
1835 | " | " | " | " | " |
1836 | " | " | " | " | " |
1837 | " | " |John Eberle |J. C. Cross | " |
| | | | | |
1838 |[A]" | " |N. R. Smith | " | " |
| | | | | |
1839 |[A]" | " | " | " | " |
1840 |[A]" | " | " | " | " |
1841 |[A]" | " | Elisha | " | " |
| | | Bartlett | | |
1842 |[A]" | " | " | " | " |
1843 |[A]" | " | " |L. M. Lawson| " |
1844 | " |J. M. Bush | L. Watson | " | " |
1845 | " | " | " | " | T. D. |
| | | | | Mitchell |
1846 | " | " | Elisha | " | Samuel |
| | | Bartlett | " | Annan |
1847 | " | " | " |E. L. Dudley| " |
1848 | " | " | " | " | " |
1849 | " | " |Samuel Annan | " |W. M. Boling|
1850 |No winte|r session | of the Medi |cal College.| |
1851 | E. L. |J. M. Bush |Samuel Annan | H. M. | S. M. |
| Dudley | | | Skillman | Letcher |
1852 | " | " | " | " | " |
1853 | " | " | " | " | " |
1854 | " | " |W. S. Chipley| " | " |
1855 | " | " | " | " | " |
1856 | " | " | " | " | " |
| | | | | |
1857 | " | " | " | " | " |
-------------------------------------------------------------------

[Footnote A: J. M. Bush, adjunct.]

[Footnote B: R. Best, adjunct.]

[Footnote C: H. H. Eaton, adjunct.]

[Footnote D: R. Peter, assistant.]

SCHEDULE A. (Continued)

SUCCESSION OF THE MEDICAL PROFESSORS IN THE MEDICAL DEPARTMENT OF TRANSYLVANIA UNIVERSITY, FROM 1799 TO 1857, INCLUSIVE.

-----------------------------------------
-----+------------+---------+------------
| Materia |Chemistry|Demonstrator
Year.| Medica, | and | of
|Botany, etc.|Pharmacy.| Anatomy.
-----+------------+---------+------------
1799 | | Samuel |
| | Brown |
1805 | | |
| | |
1809 | | |
| | |
1815 | | James |
| | Blythe |
1817 |Daniel Drake| " |
1818 | | " |
1819 | Chas. | " |
| Caldwell | |
1820 | " | " |
1821 | " | " |
1822 | " | " |
1823 |Daniel Drake|[B] " |
1824 | " |[B] " |
1825 | " |[B] " |
1826 | C. W. Short| |
1827 | " | |
1828 | " | |
1829 | " | |
1830 | " | |
1831 | " |[C] L. P.|
| | Yandell |
1832 | " |[D] " |
1833 | " |[D] " |
1834 | " |[D] " |
1835 | " |[D] " |
1836 | " |[D] " |
1837 | " | T. D. |
| | Mitchell|
1838 | T. D. | Robert |
| Mitchell | Peter |
1839 | " | " |
1840 | " | " |
1841 | " | " |
| | |
1842 | " | " |
1843 | " | " |
1844 | " | " |
1845 | " | " |
| | |
1846 | " | " |
| | |
1847 | " | " |
1848 | " | " |
1849 |H.M. Bullitt| " |
1850 | | |
1851 |J. R. Allen | Robert |J. M. Bruce
| | Peter | "
1852 | " | " | "
1853 | " | " | "
1854 | " | " | "
1855 | " | " | "
1856 | A. K. | " | "
| Marshall | |
1857 | B. P. Drake| " | "
-----------------------------------------

[Footnote A: J. M. Bush, adjunct.]

[Footnote B: R. Best, adjunct.]

[Footnote C: H. H. Eaton, adjunct.]

[Footnote D: R. Peter, assistant.]

SCHEDULE B

OF THE MEDICAL DEPARTMENT OF TRANSYLVANIA UNIVERSITY FOR THIRTY-NINE YEARS.

-----------------------------------
-----------+-----------+-----------
Year. | Pupils. | Graduates.
1817-18 | 20 | 1
1819-20 | 37 | 7
1820-21 | 93 | 14
1821-22 | 138 | 37
1822-23 | 171 | 51
1823-24 | 200 | 46
1824-25 | 234 | 56
1825-26 | 281 | 65
1826-27 | 190 | 53
1827-28 | 152 | 53
1828-29 | 206 | 40
1829-30 | 199 | 72
1830-31 | 210 | 54
1831-32 | 215 | 74
1832-33 | 222 | 69
1833-34 | 262 | 66
1834-35 | 259 | 83
1835-36 | 262 | 75
1836-37 | 242 | 78
1837-38 | 227 | 84
1838-39 | 211 | 51
1839-40 | 257 | 62
1840-41 | 254 | 64
1841-42 | 271 | 57
1842-43 | 204 | 60
1843-44 | 214 | 59
1844-45 | 156 | 38
1845-46 | 171 | 64
1846-47 | 205 | 68
1847-48 | 169 | 53
1848-49 | 120 | 49
1849-50 | 92 | 35
1850-[E]51 | 50 | 21
[F]1851-52 | 50 | 23
[F]1853 | 51 | 19
[F]1854 | 53 | 31
[G]1855 | 38 | 29
[H]1855-56 | 38 | 11
[H]1856-57 | 32 | 9
+-----------+-----------
Totals | 6,456 | 1,881
-----------------------------------

[Footnote E: Doctor Dudley resigned at the end of this session.]

[Footnote F: Spring and summer session.]

[Footnote G: Summer and winter session.]

[Footnote H: Winter session.]

Thus the records show that in thirty-nine years of the existence of the Medical Department of Transylvania University it taught six thousand four hundred and fifty-six pupils and conferred the degree of Doctor of Medicine on one thousand eight hundred and eighty-one of that number. The late Professor Thomas D. Mitchell, in speaking of its record, made the following remark: "That for its vigorous prosperity and the rapid increase of its classes, the medical school of Transylvania is without a parallel. Certainly in the United States there is nothing comparable to it. This is the highest eulogy the institution can receive. The most eloquent and forcible language in praise of it would be spiritless and feeble contrasted with the power of the foregoing figures."

SCHEDULE OF THE SEVERAL ENDOWMENTS OF TRANSYLVANIA UNIVERSITY.

Many other persons, as Honorable Edward Everett, Mr. Swan, of France, etc., have at various times made valuable contributions to the Library.

INDEX

* Before figures means that the reference is to a foot-note on
the pages indicated.

PAGE

Academical Department of Transylvania in 1857 160

Account rendered of books, etc., purchased by Doctors Bush
and Peter *91

Act endowing Transylvania University 1

Allen, Doctor John Rowan *147

Allen, Doctor John R., notice of 147

Allen, Doctor John R., in Transylvania Medical School 147

Allen, Reverend R. T. P. *133

Anderson, Reverend W. H. *133

Anecdote of Doctor Samuel Brown 9

Anecdote of Doctor E. L. Dudley *137

Anecdote of Doctor John Esten Cooke 75

Anecdote illustrating progress 9

Anecdote of Titian 47

Annan, Doctor Samuel *115
Biographical sketch of 138
At Baltimore Alms-house 138
At Hopkinsville Asylum 139
At Washington University 138
Born 138
Character of 139
Degree of M. D. 138
Honors conferred upon 138
In the Civil War 139
In Kentucky School of Medicine 141
Professor in Transylvania 138, 139
Resigns from Transylvania 139
Surgeon on steamship 139
Writings of 139, 140

Apparatus, purchase of by Doctors Peter and Bush 90, 91

Appropriation for purchase of apparatus 31

Attractive logic of Doctor Cooke 76

Avery, Charles 88

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