November 29, 1901.] 



SCIENCE. 



829 



The first non-clerical physician in the 

 list of graduates is Jeremiah Miller of the 

 class of 1709, who settled in New London. 

 He seems, however, to have been more en- 

 grossed with other occupations than with 

 medicine, so that Professor Dexter names 

 John Griswold of the class of 1721, of Nor- 

 wich, Conn., as Hhe earliest graduate of 

 the College who devoted himself exclu- 

 sively to the profession of medicine.' 



Among the two hundred and more 

 eighteenth-century graduates of Yale whose 

 principal or sole professional occupation 

 was medicine are to be found the names of 

 many physicians whose memories are pre- 

 served, and of whose useful lives and 

 faithful service in their calling this Col- 

 lege may justly be proud. Some were 

 among the most influential and widely 

 known medical men of their time and 

 country. Such were Alexander Wolcott 

 (1731), whose scholarly attainments in 

 medicine are attested by the interesting 

 collection of his books still preserved ; 

 Benjamin Gale (1733), one of the few pre- 

 Eevolutionary American physicians who 

 have left published records of valuable 

 medical observations ; Leverett Hubbard 

 (1744), corporator and first president both 

 of the New Haven County Medical So- 

 ciety and of the Connecticut Medical So- 

 ciety, for many years the recognized head 

 of the profession in this city and county ; 

 Eneas Munson (1753), successful, able and 

 learned, one of the longest-lived and most 

 remarkable physicians of his day, the first 

 name in the medical faculty of the Yale 

 Medical Institution; Jared Potter (1760), 

 described by Dr. P)ronson as ' the most 

 celebrated and popular physician in this 

 State ' in the first decade of the nineteenth 

 century ; Mason Fitch Cogswell (1780), 

 one of the ' Hartford wits, ' before the ar- 

 rival of Nathan Smith, the most distin- 

 guished surgeon in this State, whose name 

 has a pei-manent place in the history of 



surgery ; Eli Todd (1787), the first super- 

 intendent of the Retreat for the Insane at 

 Hartford, who is honored by humanitarians 

 and physicians alike as ' the first in this 

 country to introduce the more humane 

 methods of care and treatment of the in- 

 sane ' ; John Stearns (1789), professor of 

 medical theory and practice in the Col- 

 lege of Physicians and Surgeons, western 

 district of New York, president of the New 

 York State Medical Society, who has the 

 credit of first calling the attention of the 

 medical profession to the use of ergot in 

 obstetrics, and Thomas Miner (1796), 

 whose ingenious and erudite essays on 

 fevers and other medical subjects, written 

 partly in conjunction with Dr. Tully, at- 

 tracted wide attention and much comment 

 both in this country and in Europe. To 

 those familiar with this period of American 

 medical history, particularly in Connecti- 

 cut, other names will occur which might 

 with equal propriety be mentioned, did 

 time permit. 



Some who belonged to the medical pro- 

 fession are better known as holders of high 

 public ofiice, and for their services to their 

 country, than as physicians. Of the five 

 medical signers of the Declaration of Inde- 

 pendence two were graduates of Yale, both 

 in the class of 1747 — Oliver Wolcott, Gov- 

 ernor of Connecticut, who studied medicine 

 with his brother Alexander, already men- 

 tioned, and practiced for a short time in 

 Goshen, in this State, and Lyman Hall, the 

 first Governor of the independent State of 

 Georgia, where he followed his profession 

 with marked success. Nathan Brownson, 

 of the class of 1761, who was Governor of 

 Georgia, a member of the Provincial Con- 

 gress and of the Continental Congress, and 

 the holder of other high public offices, was 

 likewise a practicing physician and was ap- 

 pointed by Congress deputy purveyor of 

 hospitals and later to the charge of the 

 southern hospitals in the revolutionary war. 



