Sketches of Successful New Hampshire Men
reputation. Although deprived of a systematic course of
professional instruction, having commenced practice before
medical schools were established in New England, he provided
himself with a good library, and spent his leisure hours, and
even moments, among his books. He drew around him young men as
pupils, between twenty and thirty of whom may be reckoned as
educated by him; and, what is much to his credit, many of them
are now distinguished men.
"Dr. Crosby was for many years a member of the Church of Christ,
and died in the full hope of a better life.
"The medical profession in New Hampshire is not a little
indebted to Dr. Crosby, inasmuch as he was one of the few who
interested themselves in procuring the charter of the State
Medical Society, of which he was an active and zealous member
for thirty years. The honorary degree of Doctor of Medicine was
conferred on him by Dartmouth College in 1811."
JOSIAH CROSBY, M. D.
DR. JOSIAH CROSBY, third son of Dr. Asa Crosby, was born in Sandwich, N.
H., February 1, 1794, and died in Manchester, N. H., January 7, 1875. He
married Olive Light Avery, daughter of Daniel Avery, a merchant and
manufacturer of Gilford, N. H., February 9, 1829. He studied his
profession with his father, and the distinguished Prof. Nathan Smith of
Dartmouth College. His early practice was in Concord, N. H., and Lowell,
Mass., but his professional life-work was in Manchester, N. H., from
1844 to his death. The following extracts are taken from an obituary
notice of him read before the New Hampshire Medical Society by Dr. W. W.
Wilkins, of Manchester:--
"Here (Manchester, N. H.,) for thirty years he was the unrivaled
head of the profession. Here he originated the method of making
extensions of fractured limbs by the use of adhesive strips,
which gave him a high reputation with surgeons in Europe as well
as at home; and, later, he invented the 'invalid bed' which has
so tenderly held the patient, without a strain or jar, while the
bed-clothes could be changed or wounds cared for, or, by
dropping a belt or two, prevent local pressure and irritation.
The skillful physician, the christian gentleman, and
sympathizing friend were combinations of character in him rarely
excelled.
"Those who have known Dr. Josiah Crosby, who have had the
privilege of his acquaintance, been honored by his confidence,
and felt the influence of his pure example, will feel more
deeply than any words of mine express, the loss we have met in
his death. Few men love their life-work as he did. The practice
of medicine to him was no mere trade, no secondary means of
obtaining something else that outranked it, but the chosen
calling of his life, to which in his young manhood he gave not
only his rare mental endowments, but the rich treasures of his
heart; and with the weight of eighty years resting upon him, it
was his greatest comfort that he could still labor in his chosen
profession.
"His habits of study, that had been early formed, followed him
into old age. New theories and discoveries in medical science
were carefully criticised; the medical journals, to which he was
a liberal subscriber, were read; and he was better posted in
regard to the medical literature of the day than a majority of
the young men in the profession.
"He exerted a strong influence on the profession itself. The
quiet dignity of his character was felt by all who came in
contact with him. No unguarded words passed his lips in regard
to members of the profession that were absent that would not
have been as freely expressed in their presence.
"The same elements of character made him a superior surgeon. His
operations were complete. He had abundant resources, and, if the
ordinary methods of treatment failed, was ever ready to supply
their place by extraordinary methods. His contributions to
medical science were of a character that reflected the highest
honor upon him as a physician and skillful surgeon, and placed
him in no mean rank as a benefactor of his race.
"He never indulged in sports, or frequented watering-places. His
church, his home, and his professional duties filled to the full
his days and years, and too many sleepless nights. His
sympathies for the sick, his great benevolence, his love of
neighbor as of himself, formed the mainspring of his life
labors.
"We have known him in his strength, and we shall always
recollect him as the strong, self-reliant, active physician. We
are more than grateful for his record. Life is the sum total of
so many days and years, to which may be added the little real
good one has been permitted to accomplish in a lifetime. Looking
back over these fifty years, can we compute the worth of such a
life?"
His widow still lives, as also his son, Dr. George A. Crosby, of
Manchester, an eminent physician and surgeon.
JUDGE NATHAN CROSBY.
NATHAN CROSBY, fourth son of Dr. Asa Crosby, was born in Sandwich, N.
H., February 12, 1798; was graduated at Dartmouth College in 1820: read
law with Stephen Moody, Esq., of Gilmanton, and Asa Freeman, of Dover,
N. H., and was admitted to the bar in Strafford county in 1823. He
practiced law a dozen years, mostly in Gilmanton, N. H., and Amesbury
and Newburyport, Mass., until 1838, when he removed to Boston, at the
call of the Massachusetts Temperance Union, to conduct two important
features of the temperance cause,--the acceptance of the teetotal pledge
for the ardent-spirits pledge, and prohibition for license, and to
organize societies based upon those principles throughout the
commonwealth. He was also editor of the _Massachusetts Temperance
Journal_, the _Cold Water Army_ and _Temperance Almanac_, and various
other publications.
Subsequently, in 1843, he removed to Lowell, and was employed by the
manufacturing companies of that city to purchase the large lakes in New
Hampshire whose waters supply the Merrimack river, and secured for the
companies one hundred thousand acres of water. Before this service was
fully accomplished, he received the appointment of standing justice of
the police court of Lowell, upon the resignation of the late Hon. Joseph
Locke, who had held the office thirteen years. Judge Crosby was
qualified May 19, 1846. This position he still holds. He has rarely
failed of holding the civil terms of the court during his entire period
of service. In the discharge of the duties of a local magistrate,--a
position peculiarly trying, placed, as those duties are, so near the
people in all their differences, controversies, temptations, follies,
and depravities,--he has been at all times humane, conscientious,
incorruptible, and just, aiming to do right.
In all works of philanthropy and reform, no one has a kinder heart, or a
more willing or generous hand. His frequent appeals to the public,
through the press, upon the temperance issues of the day have been
characterized by great power, earnestness, and practical wisdom, and
have been widely read and approved. He has never held political office,
but has been in the ranks of the Federal, Whig, and Republican parties.
He was the first man in the country to give one hundred dollars for the
sanitary relief of Union soldiers in the late rebellion, and to form a
soldiers' relief association, of which he was president during the war.
He was the first college graduate from the town of his birth, and the
last of four of his class who received the degree of Doctor of Laws.
His literary productions consist of "Obituary Notices for 1857 and
1858," in two volumes, "First Half Century of Dartmouth College,"
eulogies upon Judge Wilde and Hon. Tappan Wentworth, "Notices of
Distinguished Men of Essex County, Mass.," the last being especially
illustrative of Choate, Cushing, and Rantoul, and letters and appeals to
the citizens of Lowell upon the temperance issues of 1880 and 1881. He
has a nervous, but animated and entertaining style. His "First Half
Century of Dartmouth College" is a model in its way, while his "Crosby
Family," a genealogical work, is not the dry and uninteresting reading
such literature usually is, but is entertaining, even to the general
reader, for its reminiscences of individuals, and its pleasant pictures
of old times in New Hampshire.
He has always cherished a deep interest in Dartmouth College, and to no
slight extent has, by personal effort, brought about events which have
been of substantial benefit to that ancient seat of learning.
Judge Crosby has been twice married. His first wife, Rebecca Marquand
Moody, was a daughter of Stephen Moody, Esq., of Gilmanton, by whom he
had nine children, of which number five are now living, namely, Frances
Coffin, wife of Dr. Henry A. Martin, of Boston; Hon. Stephen Moody
Crosby, of Boston; Maria Stocker, wife of the late Maj. Alexander McD.
Lyon, of Erie, Penn.; Ellen Grant, wife of N. G. Norcross, Esq., of
Lowell, and Susan Coffin, wife of Charles Francis, son of James B.
Francis, of Lowell, the distinguished engineer. His daughter, Rebecca
Marquand, widow of the late Z. B. Caverly, United States _charge
d'affaires_ at Peru, a highly accomplished and widely esteemed lady,
was, with her daughter, lost on the "Schiller," a German steamer, off
the English coast, in the spring of 1875,--a disaster which, at the
time, created profound sorrow throughout the country. He married, May
19, 1870, Matilda, daughter of James Pickens, of Boston, and widow of
Dr. J. W. Fearing, of Providence, R. I., who still lives.
Personally, the judge is a fine exemplification of the good results of
temperance, self-care, and habitual good humor; and one meeting him for
the first time, and noting his firm step and erect carriage, would
hardly think him older than a man of sixty.
DIXI CROSBY, M. D.
DR. DIXI CROSBY, fifth son of Dr. Asa Crosby, was born in Sandwich,
February 8, 1800, and died at Hanover, September 26, 1873. He married
Mary Jane Moody, daughter of Stephen Moody, of Gilmanton, a
distinguished lawyer, July 2, 1827. His academical preparation for his
profession was quite limited; but being quick to learn, and with
uncommon powers of memory, he made rapid progress in the study and
practice of his profession and early became a prominent surgeon and
physician, practicing in Gilmanton and Laconia till called to fill the
chair of surgery in the Dartmouth Medical College, as successor of
Professor R. D. Muzzey. He was placed at the head of the Medical
College, in 1838, and held the place with great ability and distinction
until nearly the time of his death.
His son, Prof. Alpheus B. Crosby, a young man of remarkable distinction,
who died August 9, 1877, succeeded him. Another and older son is an
eminent physician in Concord, N. H.
"Dr. Crosby, though a surgeon by nature and by preference, was
in no modern sense a _specialist_. His professional labors
covered the whole range of medicine. His professorship included
obstetrics as well as surgery, and his practice in this
department was exceptionally large. His surgical diocese
extended from Lake Champlain to Boston. Of the special
operations of Dr. Crosby we do not propose here to speak in
detail. It is sufficient to mention that, in 1824, he devised a
new and ingenious mode of reducing metacarpo-phalangeal
dislocation. In 1836 he removed the arm, scapula, and
three-quarters of the clavicle, at a single operation, for the
first time in the history of surgery. He was the first to open
abscess of the hip-joint. He performed his operations without