Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/69

ATLEE crushed an ordinary man. But appreciation was coming and so were patients. One came against the positive advice of her doctor and the doctor came, too, to be with her when she died on the operating-table! Yet she lived and the doctor's opposition was dead long before the patient.

Atlee in 1853 was stirring the medical world again by his methods of heroically attacking uterine fibroids with the knife. (q.v.) (New York Medical Journal, April, 1874) writes: "The name of Atlee stands without a rival in connection with uterine fibroids ... no man has yet dared to imitate him. A generation has passed since he gave to the world his valuable essay on the subject, but it is only within the past five or six years that the profession has come to appreciate the great truths he labored to establish."

The importance of tapping as a means of diagnosing was clearly demonstrated by him and the estimation of the character of the removed fluids. "It is remarkable that with so little leisure he managed to carry on an extensive correspondence; to contribute frequently to medical journals and to write an octavo volume on ovarian tumors and many essays on subjects connected with gynecology."

One of the founders of the American Gynecological Society, he also took an active part in the organization of the Philadelphia County Medical Society, the State Medical Society of Pennsylvania and the American Medical Association. Of the two former he was at one time president and of the latter vice-president, and in the last year of his life when very feeble he journeyed to meet the State Society at Pittsburg. When the final journey of all had to be undertaken he showed no fear but rather welcomed the end as a beginning of certain knowledge of things spiritual and physical. The date of his death was September 6, 1878.

His wife preceded him by eight years after a happy family life with their ten children.

Among his chief writings were numerous scientific articles to the American Journal of Science and Arts, the American Journal of the Medical Sciences, and the Medical and Surgical Reporter; including: "The Surgical Treatment of Certain Fibrous Tumors of the Uterus;" "A Retrospect of the Struggles and Triumphs of Ovariotomy in Philadelphia;" "The Treatment of Fibroid Tumors of the Uterus, 1876;" "Sarcoma of the Ovaries," 1877, and his large work, "General and Differential Diagnosis of Ovarian Tumors with Specific RefenceReferences [sic] to the Operation of Ovariotomy," Philadelphia, 1872.



Atwood, Le Grand (1832–1917)

Le Grand Atwood, pioneer neurologist and alienist of St. Louis, was born at La Grange, Tennessee, October 16, 1832. His father was N. B. Atwood, who owned a chain of wholesale drug houses, sending drugs by boat from St. Louis to New Orleans and by mule team as far west as Santa Fe. His mother was Elizabeth Le Grand of Murfreesboro, Tenn., of Huguenot descent. When Le Grand was a few months old his mother returned with him to the family home in St. Louis. There he attended the Wyman school and began the study of medicine at the early age of fifteen under his kinsman, (q.v.), a nephew of  (q.v.). Joseph McDowell's eccentric personality had a profound effect on his pupils and on none more than upon young Atwood. Later in life Atwood collected specimens of birds, skins and reptiles for the museum of the McDowell Medical College while traveling across the isthmus of Tehauntepec; the prince of story tellers, he dearly loved to tell anecdotes of his master. He took his M. D. at the Missouri Medical College in 1849 while in his eighteenth year, and became assistant demonstrator of anatomy in his alma mater long before he was of age.

After practising three years, he crossed the plains to California, washed gold and practised among the miners for two years; was a member of the "Vigilantes;" then found his way home by way of Nicaragua, staying a month or two at Graytown to assist the consul in the medical care of the natives.

He settled in Marshall, Missouri, and here he married Eliza Cowan, of Shelbyville, Tenn., in 1860.

At the breaking out of the war, Dr. Atwood was among the first to volunteer on the side of the South, enlisting as surgeon to the first regiment of Missouri State Guards. He was at the first battle of Boonville, Mo., taken prisoner at Lexington, and after his release settled in St. Louis County where he practised for fifteen years. He was a man of great personal courage and did more than his part in catching horse thieves and in seeing justice done to persecuted negroes. When at last he came to St. Louis his interest in nervous and mental diseases began. First came an