Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/816

NAME MILLER 794 MILLER vate pupil. This offer he readily embraced, and remained for nearly two years, accom- panying the doctor on his rides into the coun- try, and attending the lectures of Dr. Rush and Dr. Shippen at the University of Penn- sylvania. From Pennsylvania he returned to Washington County, New York, in 1798, and entered into co-partnership with Dr. Moshier, his former instructor, where he remained until 1801. He was licensed to practise medicine by the Vermont Medical Society in 1800. The law regulating the practice of medicine in New York was not enacted until 1806. On leaving Washington County in 1801, he came into the then town of Fabius, Onondaga County, now Truxton, Cortland County, New York, and practised there twenty-five years. From his early physical training on the farm he was well prepared for laborious duties in a new country. Where the roads were poor, many times almost impassable, yet he performed an amount of labor almost in- credible, frequently riding on horseback thirty, forty and even fifty miles a day, through storm and sunshine, with an energy that no obstacle could overcome. He loved his profession, and while attend- ing to its duties, amid all his incessant labors, found time to cultivate his mind by reading much of the current professional literature of the day, and his well-balanced mind and retentive memory enabled him to make the best use of what he read. He was elected an honorary member of the New York State Medical Society in 1808. He was the last of that band of physicians, who, in August, 1808, organized the Cortland County Med- ical Society, and its first vice-president and the oldest living member by ten years. Dr. Miller while yet in the vigor of his days, left his profession and turned his atten- tion to agriculture, and early became promi- nent in public life. His first public office was that of coroner, an appointment he re- ceived from Gov. George Clinton, in 1802. He was a justice of the peace from 1812 until 1821, and one of the judges of our county courts from 1817 to 1820. Dr. and Mrs. Miller had eight children — five sons and three daughters. Mrs. Miller died in 1834, aged 59 years. Of the family only one of the sons and two daughters sur- vived, all of them arriving at mature age. and most of them falling a victim to that destroyer of our race — consumption. In the temperance cause Dr. Miller took an early and active part. During his days of pupilage he once saw a beautiful child sacrificed in consequence of the intoxication of the physician called to its relief in an hour of suffering. This made a deep and lasting impression on his mind, and led him at the commencement of his labors as prac- tising physician firmly to resolve to abstain entirely from all intoxicating drinks. He retained his wonted faculties almost to the last hour of his long life which ended quietly on the thirtieth day of March, 1862, in the eighty-eighth year of his age. From a biography by Dr. G. W. Bradford, in the New York State Jour, of Med., Aug., 1907, vol. vii. Miller, Thomas (1806-1873) Thomas Miller's father, Maj. Miller, came to Washington with his family in 1816, and was attached to the Navy Department. The boy Thomas was born February 18, 1806, at Port Royal and received his early education under the care of the Jesuits at the old Wash- ington Seminary, afterwards known as Gon- zaga College. His medical studies were begun with Dr. Henry Huntt. After graduating M. D., in 1829, at the University of Pennsyl- vania, he practised in Washington, his office being in one of the famous buildings known as "Newspaper Row." In 1830 he united with six others to form the Washington Medical Institute, for the purpose of giving instruction to students, and in 1832 began a course of teaching in prac- tical anatomy. The same year, also, he was one of the physicians to the Central Cholera Hospital during the epidemic, and in 1833 was one of the original founders of the Med- ical Association of the District. At the time of his death he was president. In 1833 he married the daughter of a lawyer. Gen. Walter Jones. One of the incorporators of the Medical Society in 1838, he was ever afterwards an active member in furthering its interests. In 1839 he became professor of anatomy in the National Medical College and for twenty years labored as a teacher with distinction and success, on retirement being made emeritus professor and president of the faculty. In 1841 the Pathological Society was organ- ized, and Miller was its first president. He was, subsequently, one of the attending sur- geons to the Washington Infirmary, and one of the consulting staff of Providence Hos- pital and the Children's Hospital. The peo- ple did not then appreciate his efforts to abate nuisances and eradicate local causes of dis-