Page:A cyclopedia of American medical biography vol. 1.djvu/400

 ELSBERG

ELWELL

goscope in diagnosis and treatment, for this alone Elsberg, born April 2, 1836 at Iserlohn, Prussia, son of Nathan and Adelaide Elsberg deserves to be re- membered.

His people came over here and set- tled in Philadelphia when he was thir- teen, and the lad went to a public school, and took his M. D. at Jefferson Medical College in 1857. After six months as resident at Mt. Sinai Hospital he went abroad and studied under Czermak, and the year after, on returning, established the first public clinic for throat diseases. He also, with some few others, founded the American Laryngological Association and was its first president.

The records of his contributions given at the end of this sketch show the work he did despite a very large operative practice. In a paper on " Laryngoscopic Medication," 1864, he gave descriptions of many new instru- ments he had invented. His publica- tion of eleven successful operations for "Syphilitic Membranoid Occlusion of the Rima Glottidis" was made at a time when many able men doubted the feasibility and safety of surgical in- terference in such cases.

His intense application to work after a second journey to Europe, this time to recuperate, led to an aggravation of the kidney trouble from which he suffered. Ten days before his death he contracted a severe cold, pneumonia set in and his friends hardly knew he was ill before news came of his death on February 19, 1885.

He married, in 1S76, Mary Van Hagen, daughter of Joseph Scoville, of New York.

His most important writings include:

"Laryngoscopical Surgery," 1S64, which won the gold medal of the Amer- ican Medical Association; "On the Structure and Other Characteristics of Colored Blood;" "Changes in Biolo- gical Doctrines During the Past Twenty-five Years;" "Neuroses of Sen- sation of the Pharynx and Larynx;" "The Normal and Pathological His-

tology of the Cartilages of the Larynx;" "The Discovery of a New Kind of Re- sultant Tones;" and in 1880 began the quarterly publication of "The Archives of Laryngology." Among his appoint- ments he was professor of laryngology, University Medical College, New York, for seventeen years. D. W.

Tr. Med. Soo. State of N. York, 1886, (Dr. Morris H. Henry.)

Elwell, John J. (1S20-1900).

John J. Elwell, medico-jurispruden- tist, one of the ripest scholars and most courtly gentleman who ever graced the medical profession, was born near Warren, Ohio, June 22, 1820. His youth was spent on a farm, his early education acquired at the public schools of Warren and at the Western Reserve University, his medical degree from the Cleveland Medical College. For some years he practised medicine, then turned his attention to law, being ad- mitted to the bar in 1854, and enter- ing at onee into legal practice. He soon became professor of medical juris- prudence in the Ohio State and Union Law College and Western Reserve Med- ical College.

In 1S53 and 1854 he was a member of the Ohio Legislature from Ash- tabula County. In 1857 he established the "Western Law Monthly," and was for years both editor and publisher.

In August, 1861, he entered the Union army in the capacity of quar- termaster.

At Port Royal he was stricken with yellow fever, and for a time recovery seemed doubtful. Owing largely to the careful nursing of Clara Barton, he did at last get well, but with health so impaired that he was placed in command of the prison for confederates at Elmira, New York.

Dr. Elwell was a polished and copi- ous writer. In addition to editoral work he wrote voluminously for other journals, both legal and medical. He was one of the contributors to and editors of Bouvier's "Law Dictionary,"