Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/1153

NAME TEWKSBURY 1131 THACHER sian commander. At the close of the war, Dr. Teniiey returned to Exeter but did not resume the practice of medicine. In 1788 he was a meinber of the state constitutional con- vention, and in 1973 was appointed judge of probate for Rockingham County, continuing in office until he was elected a member of Con- gress in 1800; he was twice re-elected. He was made a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, August 24, 1791, and contributed to its memoirs, an account of the Saratoga mineral waters, and also his "Theory of Prismatic Colors." He was a corresponding member of the Massachusetts Historical So- ciety, to which he furnished an historical and topographical description of Exeter, and also an account of the dark day of May 19, 1780. For the Massachusetts Agricultural Society he wrote a treatise on orcharding. At various times he wrote political essays for the news- papers. Dr. Tenney was an honorary member of the Massachusetts Medical Society, from 1805 until his death, and Harvard conferred the honorary M. D. on him, in 1811. In this year and the following year, he published, in three numbers of the Neu' York Medical Re- pository, "An Explanation of Certain Curious Phenomena in the Heating of Water." He married Tabitha Oilman, in 1788. He was the author of "Adventures of Dorcasina Sheldon, or Female Quixotism," 1808, and "The New Pleasing Instructor." Amcr. Med. Biog. James Thacher, 1828. Dictny. Amer. Biog. F. S. Drake. Bost., 1872. Tewkibury, Samuel Henry (1819-1880). Jacob Tewksbury, of Hebron, Maine, was a very clever practitioner for his time, and an active member of the Maine Medical Society. He married Charlotte Nelson, of Paris, Maine, and Samuel Henry was born in Oxford, Maine, March 22, 1819. He studied medicine with his father and at the Medical School of Maine, graduating in 1841. He then attended lectures at the Harvard Medical School and at the College of Physicians and Surgeons of New York. He began practice at Frankfort, Maine, but after marrying Miss Diana Eaton, of Paris, Maine, rejoined his father in practice. In 18,^0 he moved to Portland, where he practised thirty years. Among the great things which Dr. Tewksbury did for medicine in Maine, was the introduction of the practice of gynecology, resection of the knee-joint, the successful oper- ation for stone in the bladder, by the new method, and using the first flexion and exten- sion in the reduction of a hip-joint dislocation. He was also active in clinical exhibits before the Maine Medical Association, as far back as 1855, showing his early knowledge of suc- cessful surgery, especially in cases of resection, and he was the first surgeon to the Marine Hospital, after its foundation about 1855. He was twice elected president of the Maine Medical Society, and in his addresses called special attention to the need of the formation of the Maine General Hospital. It was, later, a deep disappointment to him that the rules could not have been arranged to permit any reputable physician to put patients into private rooms or in beds not then occupied, thus making the hospital more popular and prevent- ing the diversion of charitable bequests to other institutions, managed as he suggested. Tewksbury wrote a large number of medical papers of great value, largely upon e.xcisions and on gynecology. He was a man of noble figure, handsoine face, and markedly tall. A determined and successful man, he was active but impulsive, a good anatomist and a clever, neat and skilful operator. His style in con- versation was terse, but in his papers he was inclined to be loquacious. Most of his papers were published for manj' successive years in the "Transactions of the Maine Medical Asso- ciation." He often used invectives which were soiue- times more convincing than polite. Generally brusque and apparently uncivil at times, he concealed beneath harsh words, a very knid heart. After a long and successful career of nearly forty years, he died suddenly, July 28, 1880. James A. Spalding. Trans. Maine Med. Assoc, 1880. Thacher, James (1754-1844). Standing at the head of the list of medical historical writers in this country, is the name of James Thacher, son of John Thacher of Barnstable and of a daughter of a Mr. Norton of Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts. James was born at Barnstable, February 14, 1754. As soon as he had obtained a common school education, he studied medicine with Dr. Abner Hersey (q. v. in biog. of Ezekiel Hersey) of Barnstable, and then, aroused to en- thusiasm by the opening events of the Amer- ican Revolution, he went up for examination as surgeon's mate in the army, passed high in his tests, and obtaining his appointment, served under Dr. John Warren (q. v.) at various small hospitals in Cambridge, for a year. He was then promoted to the position of surgeon in the ariny, and during the next seven years, traversed the Colonies, from Castine, in Maine, to Yorktown, in Virginia ; next at the head