Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 19.djvu/305

 General Thomas J. Jackson. 299

DR. HUNTER HOLMES M GUIRE.

Hunter Holmes McGuire, M. D., LL. D., was born in Winches- ter, Va., October u, 1835. He first studied medicine at the Win- chester Medical College, where he graduated in 1855. The following year he matriculated in the Jefferson Medical College of Philadel- phia, but sickness compelled him to return home before the end of the session. He was offered and accepted the position of professor of anatomy in the Winchester Medical College the following year and held it until 1858, when he again returned to Philadelphia, where, assisted by Drs. Lockett and Pancoast, he held a large quiz class.

In 1859 when the body of John Brown was taken through Phila- delphia there was a great outcry against all southerners, and the feeling became so bitter that many southern students proposed to return South. Dr. McGuire was a leader in the movement, and in December of the same year, after passing through many exciting scenes, arrived in Richmond at the head ot three hundred students. They were greeted with great enthusiasm, and the Medical College of Virginia agreed to matriculate them without charge.

At the outbreak of the war Dr. McGuire volunteered as a private, and marched with his regiment, as he states in the interview, to Har- per's Ferry, but on May 4, 1861, was commissioned as a surgeon and assigned to duty as medical director of the Army of the Shenan- doah, then under command of General T. J. Jackson.

When General Joseph E. Johnston took command he served under him until July ist, when at the request of Jackson, he was assigned to him as brigade surgeon of what was the future Stonewall brigade. Dr. McGuire remained in this position until Jackson took command of the army of the Valley, when he became medical director.

When Jackson received the wound at Chancellorsville, which ulti- mately proved fatal, Dr. McGuire was naturally the attending sur- geon, and found it necessary to amputate his arm. He did all that a skilful physician and tender friend could do to alleviate his suffering, but at the end of ten days the great chieftain died of pleuro-pneu- monia.

After his death Dr. McGuire served as chief surgeon of the Second corps of the Army of Northern Virginia until the close of the war.