Obituary

SIR JOHN SIBBALD, M. D., F. R. C. P., EDIN.

It is with much regret that we chronicle the death of Dr. Sibbald, which occurred on the 20th of April last, at the age of 72. Dr. Sibbald was born in Edinburgh and educated at the University of that city. After serving for some years as an assistant physician at the Abergavenny Asylum in 1862 he was appointed Medical Superintendent of the Argyllshire Asylum which he organized and opened. In 1870 he was appointed Deputy Commission in Lunacy of Scotland and in 1878, at the death of Sir James Coxe was appointed Commissioner of Lunacy, a position which he filled with much credit until he retired by reason of age in 1899, and at which time he received the honor of Knighthood. Dr. Sibbald was early attracted by the teachings of the German Psychiatrists and especially by the work of Griesinger whose teaching he followed for some time after Prof. Griesinger assumed the directorship of the clinic at Berlin. Recently he has been one of the most earnest advocates of the introduction of clinics modeled after the German clinics in Scotch University towns; and in 1902, at the meeting of the British Medico-Psychological Association the writer had the pleasure of listening to his views and learning of his opinion of the methods pursued in Germany. Dr. Sibbald died of malignant affection of the throat, symptoms of which first appear in 1904. The early diagnosis of the serious character of this affection was met with great calmness by the doctor who did not permit his knowledge of the inevitable termination of his disease to diminish his interest in his professional work; and to the end he retained his interest and activity in the specialty to which he had devoted the active years of his life, and up to within a few weeks of his death was engaged in consultation work.

A portrait of himself was presented to Dr. Sibbald on his retiring from the commissionership in 1899 which is reproduced in the July number of the Journal of Mental Science.

HENRY P. STEARNS.

Henry Putnam Stearns, A. M., M. D., was born at Sutton, Mass., April 18, 1828.

His parents were Asa and Polly (Putnam) Stearns, the former being sixth in direct descent from Charles Sterne, who was made a freeman in Watertown, Mass., in 1647, and who was a nephew of Izaac Sterne, who came to America with Gov. John Winthrop in 1630.

Polly (Putnam) Stearns was a descendant of Nathaniel Putnam, who emigrated to this country about 1634 and settled at Salem, Mass., and also of Lieut. Thomas Putnam, the grandfather of Gen. Israel Putnam of Revolutionary fame.

Thus, Dr. Stearns came, upon both sides, from the best New England stock, and his exceptional strength of character and high standard of life and conduct came to him naturally by descent from ancestors with whom conscience dominated all other considerations.

He passed through the common schools and the Monson Academy at Monson, Mass., to Yale College in 1849, where he was graduated in the class of 1853. A number of his classmates bore names which have since become well known, among them being Andrew D. White, Wayne MacVeagh, Edmund Clarence Stedman, and Charlton Lewis.

Dr. Stearns affection for his Alma Mater remained fresh and strong to the end of his life, commencement day often seeing him among the alumni present, and his pride in and affection for Yale being themes upon which he loved to dwell.

He had intended to prepare for the ministry upon graduation but, feeling a strong bias toward medical study, was much exercised as to which path in life it was his duty to adopt. He finally submitted the question to a clergyman whom he held in high esteem as a scholar and Christian and was advised that the counsels of nature were the voice of the Almighty, in many cases, and that their meaning for him might well be that he could better serve as a physician to mind and body than in the pulpit.

With his mind relieved and his scruples removed by this most excellent advice, Dr. Stearns studied medicine for one year at Harvard and for one year at Yale, taking the degree of M. D. at

the latter college in 1855. A chance remark by a classmate in praise of Edinburgh University led him eventually to continue his studies there for a year, attending, among other lectures, those delivered by Sir James Young Simpson, afterward surgeon to Queen Victoria, and numbering among his friends the late Sir John Sibbald, Commissioner in Lunacy for Scotland, with whom he corresponded at intervals throughout their lives.

During his residence abroad Dr. Stearns also attended lectures in Paris and was for a time house surgeon at the Royal Infirmary, Edinburgh.

In 1857 he returned to America, filling the position of surgeon upon the ship in which he came with his wife, formerly Miss Annie Elizabeth Storrier, of Dumfries, Scotland, whom he had married August 29 of that year and with whom he enjoyed for nearly half a century a life of ideal happiness based upon the deepest mutual affection, sympathy, and respect, until Mrs. Stearns' death, April 16, 1903. Dr. Stearns practiced his profession at Marlboro, Mass., until 1859, but, looking for a larger field, he then moved to Hartford, Conn., soon making a large circle of friends and acquiring a considerable practice there and beginning that career of nearly forty-five years of usefulness and distinction by which the city of his adoption profited so greatly. He had been endowed by nature, however, with the true soldier's temperament-eager to serve, willing to obey, and able to command, with his comrades and country a part of his most intimate self.

When therefore others around him responded to the call to arms in 1861 he simply could not remain at home but, impelled by the purest courage and patriotism and at great personal sacrifice, offered himself to his country with an eagerness and hearty good will which all who knew him well later in life can fully understand.

Mustered in for three months' service as surgeon of the Ist Conn. Regiment, his commission, dated April 18, 1861, was probably the earliest one of its class issued.

He went to the front at once with his regiment and was present and did good service at the first battle of Bull Run.

His term of service then having expired, he applied for reappointment but, in those days of confusion and favoritism, was

passed by again and again while waiting patiently in official anterooms to be allowed to give his great abilities, and life if necessary, to his country's service.

Finally he attracted the notice of an influential member of Congress, who in a few moments obtained a new commission for him, which was followed by orders to report as brigade surgeon to General Fremont then having his headquarters in St. Louis.

He was soon assigned to the staff of General Grant, and was with him throughout his whole career in the Southwest, though for a short time immediately subsequent to February, 1862, under the orders of General McClernand as medical director of the right wing of the army.

In September, 1862, he was detailed as medical inspector of hospitals on the staff of Col. R. C. Wood, Assistant Surgeon General U. S. Army, and in December, 1862, was appointed medical director of the U. S. general hospitals of the Northern Division of the Army of the Mississippi at General Grant's request. In the fall of 1863, reporting again to General Wood, he was detailed to superintend the building of the Joe Holt Hospital at Jeffersonville, Ind., and then as medical director of the U. S. general hospitals at Nashville, Tenn., where he was in charge of patients averaging 10,000 in number at all times.

He remained at Nashville until September, 1865, when he was mustered out at his own request and returned to Hartford.

During his varied experience in the army he served professionally at several of the more memorable battles besides his initial experience at Bull Run. Among these battles were those at Belmont, Ft. Henry, Ft. Donelson, and Shiloh or Pittsburgh Landing, and his descriptions of them were most interesting.

He witnessed General Grant's perilous re-embarkation at Belmont and confirms the correctness of the latter's account of it in his "Life" except in that the general was the last man but one to embark, he himself having been the last. Immediately after this battle he was asked by Confederate officers whom he met under a flag of truce, what the U. S. Government meant by its hopeless resistance to the demands of the South and how he (Dr. Stearns) thought it could all end otherwise than in victory for the latter. Although alone among many Confederates, he replied: "I think that we are as good men as you are and I know

that there are twice as many of us, and I feel sure that the end will be your defeat after a gallant but useless struggle," and time showed that he was right, although but few felt so certain of it then. He was at one time ordered to fortify his hospital and, if necessary, to defend it, and complied with the former order with a determination to fight as well as to heal which any one who knew him can understand easily. His hospital, undefended, was captured at another time by guerillas under General Forrest, with whom he had an altercation on account of his refusal to join the general in a friendly drink, but he always spoke of the guerilla chief with respect as an honorable and humane officer.

At General Grant's personal request, Dr. Stearns for some time took charge of a large steamer used to provide first aid to the wounded and to transport them to permanent hospitals and, in describing his interview with the general, quoted the latter as saying: "You can deal with me direct, calling on me for everything needed by your patients, and you have my promise that nothing shall delay attention to or cut down your requisitions." He preserved through life the highest regard for the general and lamented that it had not seemed best to call upon him in his last days at Mt. McGregor. This great pleasure Dr. Stearns denied himself because he feared to seem to intrude upon such suffering, and it was consistent with all the other characteristics of his fine nature to always dread lest an advance on his part might seem an intrusion, though no one could be less liable to such criticism.

He loved to dwell upon his army experiences and the soldier spirit was evident in all his narratives concerning them. He looked upon it as the most valuable training in his life, inculcating as it had systematic methods of working and recording results, subordination to authority, respect for the rights of subordinates, and readiness to take responsibility.

A point often mentioned by him as the chief result of this experience was the absolute necessity for sanitation of the most thorough kind in connection with surgical and medical work, a principle of late years well established but in those days not so well understood, and he congratulated himself with good reason upon the fact that, after a few months of observation, he had insisted upon it in the many hospitals under his charge, even though other desirable features had to be sacrificed.