Memorial addressed to the trustees of the Massachusetts General Hospital : in behalf of Charles T. Jackson, M.D., in relation to the discovery of etherization / By his attorneys Joseph L. and Henry C. Lord.

  • Lord, Joseph L.
Date:
1849
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Memorial addressed to the trustees of the Massachusetts General Hospital : in behalf of Charles T. Jackson, M.D., in relation to the discovery of etherization / By his attorneys Joseph L. and Henry C. Lord. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    was absolutely necessary for the defence of his character and claims, what they were constrained to regard in the Report as misstatements and suppressions of fact; misapprehension of the laws by which the scientific world is governed in adjudicating conflicting claims to discov- ery ; the urging of principles antagonistic to each other ; inconsistency in the application of principles; and this, in all instances, as it is respectfully submitted, to the injury of Dr. Jackson, and in favor of Mr. Morton. But one member of your honorable body, the author of the Report himself, having in a Vindication of it re-affirmed its main con- clusions, your memorialists have deemed it proper to make the fore- going exposition, that it may be rendered apparent to your honorable body, that according to principles maintained and the facts admitted in the Report, the discovery of etherization ought, it is respectfully submitted, to have been adjudged to Dr. Jackson, and that Mr. Morton has no claim to it whatever. The Report has subjected Dr. Jackson to expense which he could ill afford, in defence of his character and sacred rights of discovery; has done, and is still doing injury to his reputation and rights far be- yond the limits of his native country; and has thus rendered a dis- covery, which has saved from the most poignant physical suffering thousands and tens of thousands of the human race, a cause of suffer- ing to its author. The discovery of etherization has, in the extent to which it has diminished the amount of human suffering, no parallel but that of vaccination. For the latter, Jenner was rewarded by the Par- liament of Great Britain with a munificent liberality, worthy of the gratitude of a great nation; for the former, Dr. Jackson has been requited with ingratitude and detraction ; and last, not least, by the ad- judication of his discovery, on principles rejected by the scientific world, to a man whom a consistent application of principles recognised and urged in the Report leaves, as is most respectfully submitted, without a shadow of title to the discovery,— and that by the guardians of the noble institution which was the first to be benefitted by the dis- covery, and which is justly entitled to high honor for fully verifying the induction of its author. For the reasons which have been presented, your memorialists ear- nestly appeal to you, in behalf of Dr. Jackson, as just and honorable and christian men, to reconsider your Report, and repair, as far as is in your power, the injury and suffering it has brought upon him. For a reply to several allegations contained in the Report, and for the evidence in greater detail of many of our statements, we would refer to our Defence. We would also refer you to a paper furnished to Dr. Jackson, by Joseph Hale Abbot, Esq., entitled Principles recog-
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