Allen.] uOb [Dec..:, 



Obituary notice of Dr. Albert H. Smith, by Dr. Harrison Allen. 

 (Bead before the American Philosophical Society, Dec. 3, 1886.) 



Albert Holmes Smith was born in Philadelphia, July 19th, 1835. He 

 ■was the seventh child of Dr. Moses B. and Rachel D. Smith. His ances- 

 tors emigrated from England about 1685, soon after the grant by Charles 

 11 to William Penn. Dr. Moses B. Smith was a noted practitioner of 

 medicine at Bustleton, Pa., from 1814 to 1829. From the date last named 

 to that of his death he was well known in Philadelphia as a practicing 

 physician. He died in 1855 in the sixty-eighth year of his age. He was a 

 man who stood high in the estimation of his fellow-citizens. He was an 

 associate of Physick, the elder Hartshorne, J. K. Mitchell, and other emi- 

 nent medical men. He was one of the founders of the American Medical 

 Association. 



The education of Albert H. Smith was conducted in accordance 

 with tte views of the Society of Friends. After passing through the 

 Academy at Westown and the private schools of James Lippincott and 

 Henry D. Gregory, he entered the Collegiate Department of the University 

 of Pennsylvania, whence he graduated with honor in 1853. Immediately 

 after graduation he matriculated in the Medical Department of the same 

 institution, and obtained his diploma in 1856. He was fortunate in receiv- 

 ing the position of resident physician at the Friends' Asylum for the In- 

 sane at Frankford, and subsequently the more important office of resident 

 physician to the Pennsylvania Hospital. He was thus in every way 

 thoroughly prepared for the duties of practice which soon devolved upon 

 him. At an early period of his career he became identified with the 

 Nurses' Home and Lying-in Charity. He served as one of its physicians 

 and lecturers for the long period of twenty years. This unassuming charity 

 is a centre from which has always emanated authoritative teaching on 

 the subject of obstetrics. Hundreds of physicians scattered over the 

 face of our wide country have received their instruction in this all-import- 

 ant branch of medical art from Dr. Smith. The Nurses' Home was the 

 scene of much of Dr. Smith's professional labors. He here laid the foun- 

 dation of that career which in many respects was remarkable. 



For a short time Dr. Smith was one of the obstetricians to the Philadel- 

 phia Hospital, and in 1868 he became one of the consulting physicians to 

 the Woman's Hospital. Dr. Smith was twice elected president of the 

 Philadelphia Obstetrical Society, and of the Philadelphia County Medical 

 Society. He presided over the American Gynecological Association at its 

 eighth annual meeting. He visited Europe in 1880, when he was received 

 with distinction by the leading physicians both in England and on the 

 continent. In 1885 he was elected an honorary member of the Gyn- 

 ecological Society of Great Britain. 



Dr. Smith enjoyed robust health until the fall of 1883, when the symp- 

 toms of an incurable malady announced themselves. With but slight 

 abatement the disease advanced until it compelled its victim to seek abso- 



