Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/855

NAME MUNDfi 833 MUNDE turned to the fray with indomitable hope and enthusiasm. Such a gallant struggle against pitiless odds is seldom recorded. Dr. Mumford was a member of the various medical societies to which most of us belong and although he much preferred his own fire- side he was a member of the Somerset and other good social clubs, while his interest in his fellow men led him to join the Economic Club, the Reform Club and other similar bodies identified with civic uplift. His his- torical tastes naturally led him into the So- ciety of Colonial Wars. Malcolm Storer. Data have been obtained from Class-books of the Class of Harvard, 1885, from an Appreciation by Dr. Richard C. Cabot, published in the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal of April 1, 1915, and also from what the writer very vividly remembers of a dear friend. Munde, Paul Fortunatus (1846-1902) This foreigner, who took root on American soil and dying left behind a record of good gynecological and obstetrical work both prac- tical and literary, was a native of Dresden, Germany, where he was born on September 7, 1846, the son of Dr. Charles, and of Bertha Von Horneman, daughter of a councillor to the King of Saxony. The elder Munde, becom- ing involved in the revolution of 1848, came to the United States with his wife and three- year-old boy, and settled in Florence, Massa- chusetts, and opened a sanatorium. The son went to the famous Boston Latin School, af- terwards entering the medical side at Yale University. In 1864 he secured a place as acting medical cadet in the Union Army and began a career which led to his taking part in three most important wars. After six months' service he studied medi- cine again, this time at Harvard, and gradu- ated with high honors in 1866. The succee<l- ing seven years he spent in Germany, serving in 1866 as assistant surgeon in the Bavarian Army in the war between Prussia and Austria and gaining the medal of honor for services to the wounded. Three years fol- lowed as resident physician at the Maternity Hospital in Wiirzburg as assistant to Prof. Scanzoni, whose gynecological work un- doubtedly turned young Munde toward that specialty. In 1870 the war flame was again lighted in Europe and this time, as battalion lieutenant- surgeon, Munde served in the Bavarian ranks for Prussia against the French. In the siege of Paris, while away at headquarters, he was told his field hospital was on fire. He rode back to find that two inmates in the top story had been cut off by the flames. Instantly he rushed in and rescued both. For this the Emperor William gave him the iron cross. Such was the receiver's innate modesty that I never knew of this or the Austrian medal until after his death. Again the soldier turned student, at Heidel- berg, Berlin, and Vienna, where he spent nearly two years and took the degree of mas- ter of obstetrics in 1871. Later he was in London, Edinburgh and Paris seeking all that was new in gynecology and obstetrics, and when in 1873 he returned to America he de- termined, as soon as he could afford it, to de- vote himself to these specialties. This same year he married Eleanor Claire Hughes, of New Haven, Connecticut. In order to occupy his time well while prac- tice came in he, in 1874, took over the editor- ship of the American Journal of Obstetrics, and held the position eighteen years. Many of his earlier articles appeared in it and had wide influence in shaping the opinion of the day. When he became secretary to the Nevt York Obstetrical Society he had no official stenographer and relied on his own notes for the accurate and full accounts published. At that time the society was dominated by mas- ter minds— Sims, Peaslee, Emmet, Thomas, Jacobi and others. Munde was rather in ad- vance of his own set and bridged the gulf be- tween the old and the new. The surgical spirit of the times led him early to surgery and I well remember his first laparotomy (1877), an ovariotomy, of course. He did first what was then considered indispensable —drew off some of the fluid for examination, using a needle, probably far from aseptic, and an old stomach pump, the modern aspirator and antiseptic surgery being then unknown. There was a necessarily fatal result when the tumor was removed but his ne.xt case was a success. His next appointment was as as- sistant surgeon to the Woman's Hospital un- der Dr. Fordyce Barker (q. v.), but this did not give him enough surgery. He found more when he became gynecologist in 1881 to the Mount Sinai Out-door Department, where most of his surgical work was done. When the American Gynecological Society was formed in 1876, he was successively treasurer, vice- president and president. Other honors came upon him. He was president of the New York Obstetrical Society; vice-president of the British Gynecological Society ; member of the German Gynecological Society ; consulting gynecologist to the St. Elizabeth Hospital, and to the Italian Hospital.