Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/955

POWELL held on June 28, 1771, Potts had the second degree, that of doctor of medicine, conferred upon him, as well as on three other members of the first class—, (q. v.)  (q. v.) and Nicholas Way. Potts's thesis was entitled, "De Febribus Intermittentibus potentissimum Tertianis" (among the intermittent fevers the most powerful is the Tertian).

He settled to practise at Reading, Pennsylvania. He was a delegate from Berks County to the provincial meeting of deputies, held in Philadelphia, July 15, 1774, and a member of the Provincial Congress in 1775. He was active in raising men and organizing forces in Berks County. On June 6, 1776, he was appointed by Congress physician-surgeon for the Army for Canada and Lake George. The terrible condition of the hospitals and of the army were markedly improved by the zeal and efficiency displayed by Dr. Potts in executing the orders issued to establish a different state of things. In April, 1777, he was appointed to supersede Dr. Samuel Stringer as deputy director-general of the General Hospital in the Northern department. For the unremitting attention and services of Dr. Potts and of his medical colleagues during the severe campaign, public recognition was made by Congress in a commendatory resolution passed November 6, 1777. Afterwards Congress appointed him director-general of the hospitals in the middle department.

It is not known what literary matter he may have written other than an article on smallpox printed about 1771 in Henry Miller's Philadelphia German paper, called the Pennsylvania Staatsbote.

He died at Reading, in 1781, and was buried in the Friends' burying ground at Reading. He had three sons and two daughters.



Powell, Seneca D. (1847–1907)

Born in Wilcox County, Alabama, he was of colonial descent, his ancestors coming from South Carolina. Powell was a cadet in the University of Alabama at the outbreak of the Civil War when he was in his fifteenth year, and served in the southern army until the end of the war. Then he began to study medicine and graduated from the University of Virginia in 1869. He went to New York and graduated in medicine from the University of the City of New York in 1870, serving a year and a half on the house staff of Bellevue Hospital. In 1871–72 he was assistant inspector of the Board of Health, and also an assistant to the professor of medicine in Bellevue Hospital Medical College.

He soon became chief assistant to (q. v.) in the University Medical College, and held that position until the latter accepted the chair of surgery in the Post-Graduate Medical School in 1882, when he followed his chief. In the latter named place, Dr. Powell was for some years instructor in surgical dressings, then professor of minor surgery and finally of clinical surgery, a position he held until his resignation in 1905. He was president of the Medical Society of the County of New York in 1893, and of the medical society of the State in 1897–98.

Dr. Powell was one of the best teachers of surgery, especially of minor surgery. He had a fine personality, and was a very great favorite. A most important contribution to be noticed in his life is that we owe to him the discovery of the fact that pure alcohol instantly neutralizes the caustic effect of carbolic acid, thus making the acid available for the sterilization of infected areas without risk of systemic poisoning or serious local damage. Powell discovered this fact in the following manner: While at the Post-Graduate hospital preparing for an operation, he held out his hands to receive the modicum of 5 per cent solution of carbolic acid to sterilize them before doing the operation. His assistant inadvertently poured his hands full of pure liquefied carbolic acid. Dr. Powell instantly dropped the acid on the floor and immersed his hands in a bath of alcohol, which stood nearby. The skin of the hands was not injured in the least, and in this way the discovery was made. Arguing from this, he introduced the carbolic acid treatment of leg ulcers, the lesion being painted with pure acid and then the acid neutralized when it has acted sufficiently, by the application of alcohol. The Powell treatment of leg and other ulcers has been extensively followed since then, and with gratifying results. He was also greatly interested in the surgery of the skull for the relief of cerebral disease, especially idiocy. Dr. Powell contributed many interesting cases to the medical journals, especially the Post-Graduate. In 1905 he resigned from this journal, of which he had been co-editor since 1887, on account of failing health. He married twice, first a daughter of Robert Irwin, and had one son, Irwin Powell, who died in the vigor of youthful manhood a few months before his father. In 1889 Dr. Powell married Isabelle V. Wilson,