recently uncovered biography of Edward Delafield, MD

More documents

Recommendations

Info

88 SAMUELS: Edward Delajield: A Sketch municant and a vestryman. On his inward life the rites and ceremonials of that ancient church must have acted and reacted untold times. He was not only a great man, but he was a good man-one of those rare individuals who really practise their religion. He considered the use of tobacco a pernicious habit. In one of his annual charges to the graduating class he inveighed against the use of alcohol for medicinal purposes, but he kept a wine cellar that must have been well stocked, for in his will he directed that his wines be divided into six equal parts for distribution among his heirs. He was fond of astronomy, and the telescope that he used is still at "Felsenhof." Toward the end of his life he measured five feet eight inches in height and weighed about 150 pounds. His eyes were blue, and in younger years his hair was reddish. Two portraits of him, one in youth and the other in old age, hang in the Governors' Room at the Infirmary, and two busts of him are housed under the same roof. Another portrait of him is at the Academy of Medicine and one is owned by Roosevelt Hospital. Says Carlyle: "Human portraits, faithfully drawn, are of all pictures the welcomest on human walls." On Delafield's return to town from "Felsenhof," in the autumn of 1874, it was evident that his strength was failing, and that he was dwindling away in "the lean and slipper'd pantaloon." Hugh Reiley, his coachman for twenty-five years-" friend and coachman" as he called him in his willwould come into the house to help carry him upstairs at bedtime and to minister to him during his last months "in age and feebleness extreme." What changes in the world in general, and in medicine in particular, were encompassed in the one and eighty years of his earthly pilgrimage! Napoleon had won his greatest victory at Austerlitz, and had been exiled in defeat and gloom after Waterloo. Delafield was at the zenith of his reputation when the great cable across the Atlantic was laid, and the
SAMUELS: Edward Delafleld: A Sketch dome of City Hall burned at the illumination in celebration of the first message received through the Transatlantic Cable. He saw this country annex, either by purchase or by war, Louisiana, California, Florida, and Alaska. In his youth most of the country beyond the Mississippi was inhabited by savages and wild beasts. He saw the advent of what he termed "the milder medicine." Patients were no longer bled to death, as it was claimed the Father of His Country had been, when he needed all the strength that he could muster. Patients were no longer drugged with opium and rum, nor held or strapped to the operating table, things he had witnessed in his student days. Crawford W. Long, a country practitioner in Georgia, had given the first nitrous ether in the history of surgery, and had converted a scene of mortal agony, through "magic sleep," into one of tranquillity, free of pain. Edward Delafield died on February 13, 1875. A vast concourse of mourners gathered under the lofty arches of Trinity Church and crowded the sides of the adjacent street to pay tribute to him and to his brothers, Rufus and Henry Delafield, whose bodies lay before the altar beside his own. Singularly, all three, the last survivors of seven brothers, had died within three days. Their lives had been prolonged far beyond the Biblical allotted span. They were eminent men, each one an honor to his family and a credit to the city of his birth. In estimating the character of Edward Delafield a contemporary paper stated that many of his original ideas were "so incorporated in the works of the day that it would be difficult to give him all the credit justly his due." The Chaplain and a Trustee of the College of Physicians and Surgeons, who came often in intimate contact with him, the Rev. Sullivan H. Weston, in his memorial sermon portrayed him as I would have all those here present picture him to have been. He said: "He was eminently scholarly, with 89
Page 1 and 2: EDWARD DELAFIELD: A SKETCH* BERNARD
Page 3 and 4: Fig. 1.-Edward Delafield in youth.
Page 5 and 6: SAMUELS: Edward Delafield: A Sketch
Page 9 and 10: SAMUELS: Edward Delafleld: A Sketch
Page 13: SAMUELS: Edward Delafleld: A Sketch

recently uncovered biography of Edward Delafield, MD

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?