Responses to the Interrogatories of R. H. Dana

Responses to the Interrogatories of R. H. Dana

Ether

Anesthesia

Townsend, Solomon David, 1793-1869.

At the request of William T. G. Morton, “to be preserved in perpetual remembrance of the thing,” sixteen physicians--John Collins Warren and Henry Jacob Bigelow among them--with knowledge of the circumstances surrounding the ether discovery and its first surgical uses submitted depositions to the Suffolk County Justices of the Peace in 1852 and 1853.

In the deposition displayed here, S. D. Townsend, who was present at the initial demonstration on October 16, describes the first capital operation--a leg amputation--performed on November 24 and discusses the substitution of a sponge for the inhaler.

Townsend, Solomon David, 1793-1869.

1853-02-14

United States. Congress. Senate. Select Committee, to which was referred the various memorials in regard to the discovery of the means by which the human body is rendered uniformly and safely insensible to pain under surgical operations. Statements, supported by evidence, of Wm. T.G. Morton, M.D. on his claim to the discovery of the anaesthetic properties of ether ... Presented by Mr. Davis of Massachusetts, and referred to the Select Committee to whom had been referred the petition of sundry physicians of Boston and vicinity, in support of the claim of W.T.G. Morton, M.D., for the discovery of etherization. Washington, 1853, pages 355-376.

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2 handwritten pages.

English.

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Acc. 2880

Gift of Dr. David W. Cheever to the Boston Medical Library, 1902.