Usher Parsons (1788-1868), professor of anatomy and surgery in the early medical school, was born in Alfred, Maine, on August 18, 1788. He attended the village school and worked on his father’s farm, and in 1800 attended Berwick Academy for about a year. He worked in stores in Portland and Wells, and in 1807 began the study of medicine with Dr. Abel Hall of Alfred.
His studies did not progress as quickly as he wished, so he decided on a return to medicine and in or about July 1811 began his studies with Dr. John Warren of Boston. On February 7, 1812, he was licensed as a Practitioner of Medicine. In July 1812, through the good offices of Josiah Bartlett, congressman from New Hampshire, Parsons received a commission as surgeon’s mate in the navy. In the winter and spring of 1812-13, he found himself at Black Rock, near Buffalo, in charge of the sick and wounded, many of whom were felled by an epidemic of pleuro-pneumonia, about which he wrote an article for a Buffalo newspaper. He joined Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry’s expedition on Lake Erie, which met the enemy on September 10. On this occasion he acquired a great deal of medical experience, as the two other surgeons were confined by illness.
He was promoted to the rank of surgeon on April 15, 1814. During 1815 and 1816 he was attached to the frigate Java under Commodore Perry, which served in the Mediterranean, and returned to Newport in March 1817, bearing a new treaty with Algiers and eighteen mild cases of smallpox, which Parsons had induced through inoculation with the small pox virus to prevent more serious illness. In July 1817 Parsons came to Providence and boarded with Major Samuel McClellan. In November of that year he began attending lectures at the medical school in Boston, and in March 1818 he received an M.D. degree from Harvard, having written his dissertation on “the epidemic pneumonia of 1812-1813, as it appeared about Lake Erie.” His travels as surgeon of the frigate Guerrière took him to Russia and Italy, where he left the ship and went on to Paris and London to attend medical lectures and visit hospitals.
In 1820 Parsons was named professor of anatomy and surgery at Dartmouth, and lectured there for a year. Moving to Providence in April 1822, he entered into medical practice with Dr. Levi Wheaton and was appointed professor of anatomy and surgery at Brown. He lectured to both medical students and undergraduates at the college, but left as a result of President Wayland’s newly instituted requirement that all professors occupy rooms in the college during the hours of study. After the death of his wife in 1825, he boarded with McClellan until 1831. In 1832 he built an office on Waterman Street. For many years he took his meals at boarding houses and slept at the office. He had an extensive practice and wrote on medical subjects, and other diverse topics, such as the Battle of Lake Erie, early Rhode Island physicians, and Indian place names. He died in Providence on December 19, 1868.
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Usher Parsons papers, Ms. 90.1, Brown University Library.
The collection contains diaries (1831-1866), surgical notes, travel journals, account books, etc. It also includes a few manuscripts of Charles William Parsons (physician son of Usher Parsons). Only items 29 and 34 are foldered manuscripts; remaining material consists of printed and codex items.
The papers are arranged numerically by codex. Items 29 and 34 are in folders.
Acquired prior to 1950.
Related collections or materials at other institutions include:
Ten pages summarizing observations about hospitals in Italy during the first nine months of 1819. Ninety pages of journal entries in Paris, October 4 through November 26, about one-third describing hospitals, the remainder surgical notes. Sixteen pages of journal in London, December 10-22, five pages a list of lecturing physicians, the remainder surgical notes. 8vo leather blank book.
Very brief entries. 12mo leather diary in folding purse.
8vo diary.
Account of travel by rail, lakeboat and horseback. Includes descriptions of Detroit, Toledo, Chicago, Indianapolis, and Cincinnati. Extensive notes on land investing in Chicago. Five 8vo paper notebooks, approximately 100 pages of text.
Usual brief entries, with some detail of financial preparations for trip. 8vo leather blank book.
8vo leather blank book.
8vo leather blank book.
Account of ocean crossing and stay in Paris. Includes over 30 pages of surgical notes. 8vo leather covered notebook, 100 pages.
Concludes European trip, arriving in Boston on April 21. Surgical notes from Paris, London, and Glasgow. Two 8vo blank books.
8vo leather blank book.
8vo leather blank book.
8vo leather blank book.
8vo leather blank book.
8vo leather blank book.
Fairly good detail on North Carolina and coastal Georgia countryside; some description of slave labor. Notes on AMA convention in Charleston. Some overlap with 1851 diary. 12mo paper-covered notebook, 24 pages; 8vo leather notebook, 18 pages.
8vo disbound.
8vo leather blank book.
8vo leather blank book.
Two of three times a year Parsons took an account of his situation, sometimes financial, sometimes personal, sometimes both. Included are rather detailed net worth statements and reactions to current events such as the early years of the Civil War. There is an 83 item bibliography of his writing, including newspaper articles, legislative bills, apparently anything that was printed in any form. Large 8vo paper-covered notebook, 48 pages.
8vo leather blank book.
8vo diary.
Includes reactions to Fort Sumter and early days of war. 8vo leather diary in folding purse.
8vo leather diary in folding purse.
8vo leather diary in folding purse.
Reaction to end of war and Lincoln's death are very brief. 8vo leather diary in folding purse.
8vo leather diary in folding purse.
Covers service in War of 1812 including battle of Lake Erie. Inscription suggests this belonged to Henry Parsons. 126 legal size sheets.
Providence, Knowles, Anthony & Co. 4to pamphlet, 32 pages.
Descriptions of Antiquarian Hall and insane asylum in Worcester, views of Berkshires and Connecticut Valley. Although not signed by Charles, opening statement, "Tuesday aftn, June 2nd, father & I rode to Woonsocket in the chaise," is corroborated in U.P.'s diary for 1846. 22 8vo pages, disbound.
Written by Charles W. Parsons. Providence: Hammond, Angell & Co. 8vo clothbound, 72 pages.
Record of a visit to the Temple, London, April 17. Account of battle with Indians (King Philip's War?) apparently copied verbatim from unnamed source. Other miscellaneous notes, some genealogical. Does not contain Charles' name, but appears to be same hand as 1846 MS. 8vo leather.
Offers Parsons a position in the medical department of the newly founded Willoughby University. Parsons notes receiving this letter on August 15.