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 PITCHER

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PITCHER

physician, 1845; and during Buchanan's administration, surgeon of the Marine Hospital in Detroit. He was elected president of the American Medical Association at its meeting in Detroit, 1856, and was editor of the "Peninsular Medical Journal," 1855-56-58; he was president of the Old Territorial Medical Society during fourteen years; president of the Michigan State Medical Society, 1855-56; a founder of the Sydenham Society; a founder of Detroit Medical Society, 1852-58. Zina Pitcher was versed in the habits of beasts and birds; his contributions to Indian materia medica were classic. His perception of scientific facts was imusually quick and his memory tenacious. In driving through the country he at once detected an unfamiliar plant or animal, secured a specimen and determined its place. While in Texas he collected many fossils and forwarded them to the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences. Studies of these and alhed collections were the basis of Dr. S. G. Morton's work entitled "Cretaceous System of the United States." One of the specimens is known as "Gryphoea Pitcheri." In "Gray and Torrey's Flora of the United States" several new species are named after Dr. Pitcher in acknowledgment of his service to botany. So general is the use of hot water in checking hemorrhage that few remember that it originated with Dr. Pitcher. His home was at the service of the sick; he was known to have taken a stranger suffering from small-pox into his home, and both nurse and doctor him to recovery. Moreover, to him the Bible was a guide, a counsellor and inspiration.

In 1824 Zina Pitcher married Ann Shel- don, of Kalamazoo, Michigan, and had a son (Nathaniel) and daughter (Rose), the mother dying in 1864. In 1867 he married Emily Backus, grand-daughter of Col. Nathaniel Rochester, of Virginia, the founder of Rochester, New York, and on the death of DeWitt Clinton, acting governor of New York.

Dr. Pitcher died April 5, 1872, from unoperated stone in the bladder.

His papers included:

1832. "Penetrating Wound of the Abdomen and Section of the Intestinal Canal Successfully Treated on the Plan of Ramdohr." ("American Journal, Medical Sciences," vol. x, p. 42.) (Under the conditions this was a remarkable piece of surgery.)

1852. "Report of Committee on Epi- demics of Ohio Indians and Michigan." (By G. Mendenshall and Zina Pitcher; Ibid.)

1853. "Are Typhus and Typhoid Fevers Identical?" ("Peninsular Med- ical Journal," vol. i, second series.

1853. "Epilepsy Treated by Ligation of the Common Carotid Artery." (" Pen- insular Medical Journal," vol. i, pp. 8-10.)

1854. "Medicine of American In- dians." (Part 4, pp. 502-519, of Schoolcraft's " Information Respecting the History and Prospects of the Indian Tribes of the United States," Philadel- phia, 1854.)

1855. "On the Induction of Puerperal Fever by Inoculation." ("Peninsular Medical Journal," vol. ii.)

1855. "Amputation in Utero." (Ibid., vol. iii.)

1855. "Malformation of the Heart." (Ibid., vol. iii.)

1855. "Report on the Epidemics of Ohio Indians and Michigan for the Years 1852-53." (G. Mendenhall and Zina Pitcher, "Transactions, American Med- ical Association," vol. vii, presented in 1854.)

1856. "Scurvy from Moral Causes." ("Peninsular Medical Journal," vol. iii.)

1856. "Case of Vicarious Menstrua- tion Showing also the Morbid Relations of the Colon and Uterus." (Ibid., vol. iv.)

1857. "Morbus Coxarius." (Ibid., vol. iv.)

1857. "Alterative Influence of Valvu- lar Heart Disease in Pulmonary Tubercu- losis." (Ibid., vol. V.)

1858. "Chnical Instruction." ("Pen- insular and Independent Medical Jour- nal," vol. i. Response to A. B. Palmer.)

1858. "On the Influence which Theo- retical Opinions in Medicine have Exer-