Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/720

NAME LETT 698 LETTERMAN Leonard's work was notable in three direc- tions : (1) as a pioneer and a leader in a new and brilliant specialty; (2) one of the foremost in introducing the improved tech- nique of instantaneous Roentgenography; (3) as a pioneer in the detection of renal and ureteral calculi, he exercised a strong influence over conservative surgical practice by showing that a large percentage of small ureteral cal- culi passed spontaneously if let alone. A list of his writings comprises some fifty-one pa- pers. Dr. Leonard found his recreation in the Canadian woods. His hands, badly burned in the early days, grew slowly worse, and then began the fruit- less battle against the invasion of the body ; first a finger was amputated, the left hand, and finally death intervened. Always cheerful, never asking for sympa- thy even in his extremity, he died at Atlantic City, New Jersey, September 22, 1913, at the age of 51 years, a universally beloved, brilliant scientist who laid down his life for his fellows. Thomas S. Stewart. Lett, Stephen (1847-1905) Stephen Lett, who died October 11, 1905, was a son of the Rev. Stephen Lett, LL. D.. D. D., of the County of VVicklow, Ireland, and later of Toronto and Collingwood. He was born at Callan, Kilkenny, Ireland, April 4, 1847, and was educated at Upper Canada College, Toronto. He became a member of the College of Physicians and Surgeons in 1870 and took his degrees at Toronto Uni- versity. For many years he filled the position of assistant medical superintendent in London and Toronto asylums, leaving Toronto, Janu- ary, 1884, to become superintendent of the Homewood Sanitarium at Guelph. In the fall of 1901 he developed general paresis, which ended fatally in October, 1905. Dr. Lett was well known all through Can- ada as an alienist of many accomplishments and enjoyed a well-deserved popularity. No doubt if he had remained in the Ontario serv- ice he would have become the head of one of the provincial hospitals, but as events proved he did an excellent work by founding the first private asylum of any importance in the Province of Ontario. Institutional Care of the Insane in the U. S. and Canada. Henry M. Hurd. 1917. Letterman, Jonathan (1824-1872) Jonathan Letterman, organizer of the medi- cal department of the army in the civil war, was born in Canonsburg, Pennsylvania, Decem- ber 11, 1824. His father was a surgeon and his mother a daughter of Craig Ritchie, of Can- onsburg, near Pittsburgh. Letterman was ed- ucated by a private tutor until he entered Jefferson Medical College and took his M. D. there in 1849, at once entering the army as assistant surgeon. He served in Florida, Min- nesota, Kansas, Virginia, California, and in 1861 began duty with the army of the Poto- mac, becoming surgeon in July, 1862, when he was made medical director of this division of the Union forces, under the command of Ma- jor-General McClellan. Thirteen years experi- ence on the frontier posts and in campaigns against the Seminoles, Navajos, Apaches and Utes had assisted in preparing Dr. Letterman for his new duties. At once he evinced a re- markable grade of administrative ability, re- habilitating the service of the sick, creating a military medical organization, installing an ef- fective hospital service, also instituting a sys- tem of transportation of the wounded in charge of an ambulance corps, making the medical department adequate to the needs of even such great battles as Chancellorsville and Gettysburg. The organization thus creat- ed formed the basis of the military medical administration during the remainder of the war. In October, 1863, Dr. Letterman married Mary Lee of Virginia, whom he had met at her house, coming tired and hungry from the battle of Antietam. She waited on him and it was appropriate that when they were mar- ried, the medical officers of the army of the Potomac should present them with a hand- some silver service. Having completed the medical organization of the army, he was relieved as inspector of hospitals in the department of the Susque- hanna. There he remained for a year and then took up his residence in San Francisco, California. In 1866 he wrote "Medical Recol- lections of the Army of the Potomac," and in the following year he was elected coroner in San Francisco and served two terms. The sudden death of his wife, November 1, 1867, combined with a chronic intestinal trouble, from which he had long suffered, undermined his health and he died, March 15, 1872, being only a few months over forty-seven years of age. By a general order of the War Department, November 13, 1911, a government hospital, of five surgical and four medical wards, each of forty beds, built on the pavilion plan, and sit- uated within a quarter of a mile of San Fran- cisco, where it gets the ocean breezes through the Golden Gate, has been named the Letter-