icon for Home page
icon for Kid's Home page
icon for Digital Collection
icon for Activities
icon for Turns Exhibit
icon for In the Classroom
icon for Chronologies
icon for My Collection

Online Collection
Select a transcription:

Throat Disstemper
1785
May 2nd. Went to see Whitcomb's Child
1 year 6 months old, who about a fortnight
before left the small Pox Hospital, &
for a week past had a fever of ye Tert.n
intermittent kind & ye day before was taken
with ye following symptoms (viz.) a sore-
ness of ye throat, a listlessness to all kind
of diversion, inappetency, & restlessness,
the night following was very uneasy,
tumbled & tos'd all night, slept very
little - found it attended with the fo-
llowing Symptoms - A small, quick,
& hard pulse; the tongue a little furr'd,
the Parotid glands & external parts of
the throat much swelled; breathing
noisy & hollow; lying in a stupid, dosy,
state, with ye Eyes half shut & watery.
Directed thus - A Purge of Rhei & Ca-
lomel to be taken immediately; left

(c) Pocumtuck Valley Memorial Association, Deerfield MA. All rights reserved.
Contact us for information about using this image.



label levels:

William Stoddard Williams (1762-1829) learned to be a doctor through the apprenticeship system. His own father, also a doctor, died in 1775, and so he was sent to Stockbridge, Massachusetts, to apprentice to a cousin, Dr. Sargeant. After his training in the Berkshires, he spent a year as physician in the nearby town of Richmond, after which he returned to Deerfield to practice. His meticulous entries in his medical account books are very revealing of the state of medicine in the late 18th and early 19th centuries in America.

 

top of page

Dr. William Stoddard Williams' description of a throat distemper diagnosis

author   William Stoddard Williams, M.D. (1762-1829)
date   May 2, 1785
location   Deerfield, Massachusetts
height   6.25"
width   7.75"
process/materials   manuscript, paper, ink
item type   Personal Documents/Journal
accession #   #L99.026


Look Closer icon My Collection icon Document Image icon Detailed info icon


ecard icon Send an e-Postcard of this object



See Also...

Medical proficiency certificate of William Stoddard Williams

Letter from Deerfield Selectmen re: travel of William Stoddard Williams

A List of Wearing Apparel, Books, &c. of William Stoddard Williams


button for Side by Side Viewingbutton for Glossarybutton for Printing Helpbutton for How to Read Old Documents

 

Home | Online Collection | Things To Do | Turns Exhibit | Classroom | Chronologies | My Collection
About This Site | Site Index | Site Search | Feedback