Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/56

APPLETON he ably filled the chair of the institutes and practice of medicine, obstetrics and diseases of women and children. As often the case with the general practitioner of long ago, he was equally skilled in the different departments of medicine and was the first gynecologist to adopt and point out the knee-chest posture in the treatment of uterine displacements. It is also to be noted that he perfected the treatment of fractures of the thigh by weight extension. His skill and boldness as a surgeon can be fully realized when it is known that in 1821 he excised the fifth and sixth ribs, and removed a portion of gangrenous lung. This remarkable piece of work is reported in the Philadelphia Journal of Medical and Physical Sciences, 1823, vol. vi.

The article was so original and bold that it was republished in 1893 by Dr. George Foy of the Royal College of Surgeons of Dublin, Ireland, in the Medical Press and Circular. Dr. Antony's contributions to medical literature, while numerous and valuable, are not obtainable.

Though the life of this distinguished man began with all the disadvantages consequent to poverty and want of education, his energy and perseverance enabled him to attain a high position in his profession and to maintain it until the fatal epidemic of yellow fever in Augusta, Georgia, in 1839, brought his life to a close. He was editor of the Southern Medical and Surgical Journal as far as its first two volumes.

At the request of his faculty, his body was buried in the college grounds and a tablet to his memory stands in the wall of the principal lecture room of the college which he founded.



Appleton, Moses (1773–1849)

The Appletons of New Ipswich, New Hampshire descended from men of English stock who came over to Ipswich, Massachusetts, for religion's sake, and moving to a new settlement in New Hampshire named it after their abode in Massachusetts. Moses, the son of Isaac and Mary Adams Appleton, was born in New Ipswich, May 17, 1773, graduated at Dartmouth in 1791, taught school in Medford and Boston, Massachusetts, studied medicine with Governor (and (q.v.) of that commonwealth and obtained fellowship in the Massachusetts Medical Society in 1798.

It happened that Appleton had at Dartmouth a classmate and fellow townsman, Reuben Kidder, who was now practising law in Winslow, Maine. Appleton inquired of him concerning Waterville, across the Kennebec from Winslow, as a place for practice. Was there business enough for a young doctor; was there a drug shop near; were the roads good or bad? Kidder replied that there were six shops, thirty buildings, and about a thousand people living mostly in log houses; no drug shop except at Hallowell, thirty miles down the river, that the roads to the South were good, those to the north rather poor, and fall and spring all alike were muddy. Kidder mentioned (q.v.) as a pioneer in the field, but said that he would be glad of a younger man in the place. He finished his letter by saying that he was just then putting up a building, and that Appleton could have half of it for an office and dwelling if he would only come on at once.

Encouraged by such news as this, young Appleton made his way to Waterville immediately and remained there the rest of his life. Dr. Williams, who was a remarkable pioneer physician in the Kennebec valley, was of great assistance, became Appleton's first patient by the extraction of a tooth for which he paid "a small fee for luck," as he insisted, and died in three years' time, leaving Dr. Appleton the only physician in the now flourishing town.

He improved every opportunity, worked faithfully for all his patients, had ninety-six of them in his first year of practice, rode in every direction for years and became a man much thought of by all with whom he came in contact.

He was one of the earliest members of the Maine Medical Society, founded directly after the separation of Maine from Massachusetts, and was a frequent attendant at the meetings in spite of difficult travel. Much of his practice was on the basis of barter, instead of cash which was scarce, and amongst other items in his old account books may be seen those of his treating the family of a shoemaker in return for boots and shoes for himself, and the family of another man for firewood, sawed, split, and piled.

Dr. Appleton married Miss Annie Clarke, daughter of Col. Clarke of St. Georges, Maine, in 1801. He was a generous man, yet accumulated money; was founder and president of the first bank in Waterville; was religious in this way, that although not much given to prayer, he would read the prayers and a printed sermon on a Sunday when no parson could be found at hand. He read one or two papers before the Medical Society, and published one or two in the medical journals of