Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/1120

NAME STEUART 1098 STEVENS and solicited the sum of $20,000, which was required, in addition to the state appropria- tion, to purchase the site. There the hospital was known as the Spring Grove State Hos- pital. Dr. Steuart was president of the board of managers. Originally a man of wealth, he gave largely of his means to the hospital, and it was not until he became impoverished by the Civil War that he consented to receive any compensation for his services. The material for a sketch of Dr. Steuart's life is very meagre, as he wrote little. He was a man of vigor of character and intellect and possessed an easy dignity which attracted rather than repelled approaches. His remark- able suavity and tactful personality were shown in the success he attained in securing contributions to benevolent objects. No one had the power to refuse him; his gentleness, his enthusiasm, his eloquent speech, were irre- sistible. He was instrumental in bringing Miss Dorothea L. Dix to Maryland in 1852, and introduced her to the members of the Legis- lature at Annapolis, where she spent the whole winter in urging upon them the better care of the dependent insane. Before the war he possessed a large pro- ductive estate on West River, Anne Arundel County and many servants (slaves), but he never gave up his life work as a physician. His mind, his heart and his purse were ever at the call of the unfortunate. Dr. James A. Steuart, his son, bears per- sonal testimony to the influence exerted by his father over the mind of the late Johns Hop- kins in choosing the site of the Johns Hopkins Hospital.t He says: "After the building of the new hospital at Catonsville, which had been interrupted by the war, had been re- sumed, it was decreed by the Legislature that the grounds and buildings of the old hospital in Baltimore should be sold to pay for the new. At the annual meeting of the Board of Visitors a discussion arose as to how the property should be sold and at what price. Several propositions had been presented by property agents and others, but nothing had been decided. As Dr. Steuart and Johns Hopkins were standing together after dinner on the front steps of the hospital, the former, who had held many conversations with Mr. Hopkins in regard to his declared intention of leaving the greater part of his fortune to found a university and hospital, said ; 'Hop- kins, why will you not buy this property and hold it as a part of your estate which you intend to bequeath for such noble purposes, tPrivate letter, quoted by Dr. John Morris in The Johns Hopkins Hospital Bulletin, vol. vii, p. 40. and found your great hospital here upon this liistoric ground? The space is ample, the situation all that could be desired, and I will use my influence with the Board to sell it to you — in view of the great purpose you have in mind — for $150,000, which is far below its market value, li you postpone action in the matter the Board will be obliged to sell and your opportunity will be lost, unless,' he added, 'yo" care to pay more to others at a later period to recover the property for the site of your hospital.' Mr. Hopkins, as was his habit, deliberated for some minutes, and then said : 'Doctor, what you have said has great weight in my mind, and I will give you an early answer.' Not many days after this conversation Mr. Hopkins purchased the prop- erty which is now the site of the Johns Hop- kins Hospital." Henry M. Hurd. Stevens, Alexander Hodgdon (1789-1869) This noted New York surgeon was of the Stevens family which came originally from Cornwall, England, and settled in Boston. General Ebenezer Stevens, father of Alex- ander, was a member of the famous Tea Party that threw the tea into Boston Harbor in 1773, and served subsequently throughout the War of the Revolution, making his home in Rhode Island. .Alexander, the third of the six sons born to Ebenezer and Lucretia Led- yard Stevens, came into the world in New York City on September 4, 1789. His educa- tion was begun by private teaching and in 1807 Yale College completed his academic edu- cation with an A. B., followed by medical study under Dr. Edward Miller and the tak- ing of an M. D. in 1811 from the University of Pennsylvania. He served in the surgical service of the New York Hospital for seven months and then voyaged to Europe as a de- spatch bearer, but was cnptured by an English J cruiser and detained a prisoner at Plymouth, ^ England. When freed he went up to Lon- don and attended the lectures of leading sur- geons, especially Abernethy and Astley Cooper. Then followed Paris and an interne service under Alexis Boyer, whose "Surgery" he translated into English on returning to New York. Again made prisoner after embarkation, he was soon liberated and on reaching America took an appointment as. army surgeon while the war lasted. In 1814- 1815 he lectured as professor of surgery in the medical department of Queen's College, New Jersey, later Rutgers' and Princeton Col- lege, and married in 1813, Miss Ledyard of New Jersey. While surgeon to the New York Hospital, froin 1819 to 1839, he introduced