Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 13.djvu/780

 SEMMELWEIS

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SENA

scriptions (New York, 1904); Pognon, Inscriptions simitiques (Paris, 1907); Chwolson. GrSbinschriften aus Semirjelschie (St. Petersburg, 1886); Heller, Die nestorianische Denkmal ru Si-ngan-fu (Budapest. 1897); Pognon, Coupes mandaltes de Khoiiabir (Paris, 1S99); Littmann, Zamudenische Inschr. (Berlin, 1904); Dussand, Voyage au SafA (Paris, 1901): MOller, Epigraphische Denkm&ler aus Arabien (Vienna, 1889); Idem, Epigraph. Denkmdler aus Abessinien (Vienna, 1894) ; Van Ber-

CHEM, Corpus inscrip. arabicarum (Paris, 1894— ). For the study

of the inscriptions, see Lidzbarski, Handbuch der nordsemiti- schen Epigraphik (Weimar, 1898), an excellent manual; Idem, AUsemiiische Teite (Giessen, 1907); Cooke, North-Semitic In- scriptions (Oxford, 1903); Clermont-Ganneau, Etudes d'archeol. or. (Paris, 1S95) ; Recueil d'archiol. or, I-VIII (Paris, 1880-1911); Lidzbarski, Ephemeris fUr semit. Epigraphik, I-III (Gics.sen, 1901-11),

B. Chabot.

Semmelweis, Ignaz Philipp, physician and dis- co^•crer of the cause of puerperal fever, b. at Of en (Buda), 1 July, 1818; d. at Vienna, 13 August, 1865. The son of a German merchant, he became a medical Btudent at \'ienna in 1837, and after he had taken a philosophical course at Pesth, continued his medical studies there, obtaining his degree in medicine at Vienna on 21 April, 1844, as obstetrician on 1 August, 1844, and as surgeon on 30 November, 1845. On 27 February, 1846, he was made assistant at the first obstetrical clinic of Vienna, and on 10 October, 1850, lecturer on obstetrics. A few days after this appoint- ment, for reasons unknown, he removed to Pesth where he was made head physician at the hospital of St. Roch on 20 March, 1851, and on 18 July, 1852, was appointed regular professor of theoretical and prac- tical obstetrics. Early in 1865 the first signs of mental trouble appeared, and on 31 July he was taken to the public insane avsylum near Vienna where he died from blood-poi.soning. At the end of May, 1847, Semmelweis made the a.ssertion that the terrible en- demic at the \'ienna hospital among lying-in women was caused by infection from the examining physicians, who had previously made pathological dissections, or who had come into contact with dead bodies without thorough cleansing afterwards. After Semmelweis had introduced the practice of washing the hands with a solution of chloride of lime before the examination of Ijnng-in women, the mortality sank from 18 per cent to 2-45 per cent. He also soon formed the opinion that not only infection from septic virus caused puerperal fever but that it also came from other cau.ses of putridity. His dislike of public speaking or of writing was probably the cau.se why the recognition he deserved was so long in coming and why his views were misunderstood. Alany scholars, among them the doctors of the Academy of Paris and even Rudolph Virchow at Berlin, regarded him un- favourably. The petty persecution and malice of his opponents excited in Semmelweis a sensitiveness that increased from year to year. The first account of his di.scovery was published by Professor Ferdi- nand Hebra in December, 1847, in the journal of the Imperial and Royal Society of Physicians of Vienna (December, 1847), followed by a supplementary statement from the same physician in April, 1848. In October, 1849, Professor Josef Skoda delivered an address upon the same subject in the Imperial and Royal Academy of Sciences. Unfortunat<'ly, Semmel- weis had neglected to correct the papers of th(!se friends of his, and thus failed to make known their mistakes, so that the inference might be drawn that only infection from septic virus caused puerperal fever. It was not until 15 May, 1850, tlial SemDiel- weifl cx)uld bring himself to give a lecture ui)ori his discovery before the Society of Physicians; this £id- dress was followed by a second on 1 8 June, 1850. The medical pr<«s noticed these lectures only in a very unsatisfactory manner. In 1861 he published his work: "Die Aetiologie, der Begriflf und die Prophy- laxis des Kindbettfiebers" (Vienna), in which he bitterly attacked his supposed and real opponents. It was not until after his death that Semmelweis

found full recognition as the predecessor of Lister and the pioneer in antiseptic treatment. Besides the above he wrote: "Zwei offene Brief e an Dr. Josef Spath und Hofrat Dr. Friedrich Wilhelm Scanzoni" (Pesth, 1861); "Zwei offene Brief e an Dr. Eduard Kaspar Jakob von Siebold und Hofrat Dr. Fr. W. Scanzoni" (Pesth, 1861); "Offener Brief an samtliche Professoren der Geburtshiefc" (Of en, 1862).

Hecjar, Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis (Freiburg, 1862); Grosse, Ignaz Philipp Semmelu-eis (Leipzig and Vienna, 1898); SchOrer VON Waldheim, I(inaz Philipp Semmelweis (Vienna, 1905).

Leopold Senfelder.

Admiral Raphael Semmes, C'.S.X.

Raphael, naval officer, b. in Charles Countv, Marvland, U. S. A., 27 September, 1809; d. at Point Clear, Alabama, 26 August, 1877. His family were descendants from one of the original Catliolic colonists of Maryland, from which state lie was ai)pointed a midshipman in the U.S. Navy 1 April, 1826. He served until 1832, when Ik; was given leave of absence extend- ing until July, 1835, during which time he studied law and was ad- mitted to practice. Rejoining the navy, he ser\'ed with distinction, attaining the rank of commander, until the outbreak of the Civil War, when he resigned and cast his lot with the seceding state of Alabama, of which he became a citizen in 1841. He was appointed com- mander in the Confederate States Navy, 25 March, 1861; Captain, 21 August, 1862; Rear-Admiral, 10 February, 1865; and retired to civil life after the sur- render of the forces under General J. E. Johnston at Greensboro, North Carolina, 26 April, 1865. As commander of the Confederate privateer Sumter he destroyed, during six months in 1861, eighteen ships, and the next year, taking command of the Alabama, he began the famous cruise during which he captured sixty-nine vessels and inflicted a l)low on the sea- carrying trade of the Tnifed States from which it has not yet recovered. After the Alabama was sunk off the French coast by the Kear.sarge, 19 June, 1864, he escaped to England, whence he later returned to Virginia and was engaged in the defences about Rich- mond. At the end of the war he went to his home in Mobile, Alabama, and o])ened a law office. He also edited a paper, and for a time was a professor in the Louisiana Military Institut(^ His destruction of the mercantile marine during his cruise in the privateer Alabama so embittered northern public opinion against him that, although he was pardoned with oth(T prominent Confederate leaders under the amnesty proclamation of President Johnson, his I)olitical disabilities were never removed. He was the author of "Service Afloat and Ashore During the Mexican War" (1851); "The Campaign of (Jeneral Scott in the Valley of Mexico" (1852); "The Crui.se of the Alabama and Sumter" (1864); and "Memoirs of Services Afloat during the War between the States" (1869).

FuREY in U. S. Hist. Soc. Records and Studies (New York, 1911); Morning Star (New Orleans), files; Nat. Cyclo. Am. Biog.,

8. V.

Thomas F. Meehan.

Sofia, Balthahau, Indian missionary and philolo- gist, b. at Barcelona, Spain, about 1590; d. at Gua-