Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/1099

NAME SMITH 1077 SMITH McClellan (q. v.), anatomist and surgeon, who was then giving private instruction in that city to large classes. This gentleman and others were then engaged in organizing a new med- ical school, the Jefferson Medical College. Being impressed by the abiUty and acquire- ments of Dr. Smith, they invited him to join with them and offered him the chair of anatomy, and he accepted. In 1825 he published at New York an "Essay on Digestion" of ninety-three pages and after his settling at Philadelphia, edited in 1825-26, with the cooperation of his father, the "American Medical Review." In June, 1827, he founded a medical periodical entitled the Philadelphia Monthly Journal of Medi- cine and Surgery, which was continued into the following year and then merged into the Avierican Journal of the Medical Sciences. In 1827 Dr. Smith's connection with Jef- ferson Medical College was severed by his acceptance of the chair of surgery in the University of Maryland, made vacant by the withdrawal of Granville Sharp Pattison (q. v.). With this event commenced Dr. Smith's long and eventful career of fifty years at Bal- timore, terminating only with his death in 1877. In 1829 appeared his work on "Diseases of the Internal Ear," being a translation, from the French of J. A. Saissy, with a supple- ment of twenty pages by himself, on "Dis- eases of the External Ear." In 1830 he issued a journal, entitled The Baltimore Monthly Journal, the first number of which appeared in February. It continued until the end of the year, when it ceased on account of lack of support. In the September and October numbers appeared a noteworthy article, en- titled "Description of an Apparatus for the Treatment of Fractures of the Thigh and Leg, by Smith's Anterior Splint." One-half of the original matter of the volume of 510 pages consisted of contributions by Smith. The Medical and Surgical Memoirs (of Nathan Smith, his father), appeared in 1831 with a memoir by N. R. Smith. He was for many years a collaborator and frequent contributor to the American Journal of the Medical Sciences. He also wrote many articles for a journal published at Baltimore by Prof. E. Geddings of the University of Maryland, from 1833 to 1835; for the Maryland and Virginia Medical Jour- nal, 1860-61, of which Dr. W. Chew Van Bibber was a co-editor, and for the Baltimore Medical Journal, founded in 1870 by Drs. Howard and Latimer. In 1832 appeared his great work on the "Surgical Anatomy of the Arteries," quarto, of which a second edi- tion appeared in 1835. In 1867 he published a small volume of seventy pages, giving a description of the method of using his "Anterior Suspensory Apparatus in the Treatment of Fractures of the Lower Extremity, with Cuts and Dia- grams." And finally he issued a little duo- decimo in 1869, which he called "Legends of the South, by Somebody Who wishes to be Considered Nobody." Early in his career at Baltimore he conceived the idea of writing a work on "Surgery" with good cuts, and did from time to time compose a large part of it, but it remained at his death among his unfinished papers. In 1867, when seventy years old, he made his first and only visit to Europe. Although he sought in it only relaxation from his labors and amusement, he naturally visited many of the great European hospitals. His reputa- tion had preceded him everywhere and he was received with the greatest deference. Sir James Paget in London being particularly attentive and the French surgeons giving him the title of the "Nestor of American Sur- gery." He continued his active work at the Uni- versity for two years longer, when he re- signed and was made emeritus professor and president of the Faculty. In 1870 he was elected president of the Medical and Chirur- gical Faculty, and the following year was re- elected to the same office, special provision being made in his case for this unusual honor. Not long after this, painful disease and in- firmities of age began to oppress him. He still attended to office consultations, wrote upon his surgery, found pleasure in review- ing the classics, especially Homer and Virgil, and, above all, found that satisfaction and peace in the Christian religion which philoso- phy and science had been unable to secure for him. Thus engaged, the painful disease of the bladder from which he suffered slowly advanced and finally mastered his vigorous constitution on the third of July, 1877, a few weeks after he had passed his eightieth year. He always lectured without notes and in slow, deliberate fashion. His voice was of medium pitch and distinct, though not strong. He indulged in story and humor whenever the opportunity permitted, although he was never coarse, profane or obscene. The por- trait of him at the university is an admir- able Hkeness, and represents him in his char- acteristic attitude while lecturing.