WILSON
could be summoned. So ended the life
of this man who was preacher, philoso-
pher, scientist and doctor. His biog-
rapher gives a little portrait of him as
very tall, dignified, in some respects
eccentric, and to people who displayed
w-ilful ignorance or disregard to religi-
ous truth "his language and manners
possessed a degree of what might be
denominated Johnsonian rudeness."
Fortunate!}' the Johnsonian genius was
his also.
D. W.
Essays on Various Subjects, N. York, 1824. A Biographical Memoir of Ilugli William- son, D. Hosack, N. York, 1820. Portrait in the Surg-general's Library, Wash., D. C.
Wilson, Ellwood (1822-1889).
The son of a farmer in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, Ellwood Wilson, gynecol- ogist and obstetrician, was born in that county on February 4, 1822, and had for early education the village school and library. After acting as druggist's apprentice he graduated from the Jeffer- son Medical College in 1845 and went that same year on the staff of the Philadelphia Dispensary, a place which furnished him plenty of obstetrical and gynecological cases, his ability leading Charles D. Meigs to take him as assistant, and, when Meigs retired, a good deal of the practice fell to Wilson; also he succeeded Dr. Warrington in the Philadelphia Lying- in Charity, and when associated with him founded and conducted the first training school for nurses, and was also a founder of the Philadelphia Obstetrical Society. It is believed he was the first to establish a dispensary there for the exclusive treatment of women and the first to clinically lecture on their diseases. As he was instrumental in helping some 34,000 babies into the world he did not get much time to write about any abnor- malities in them or their mothers. He entered into a discussion with Dr. William Goodell upon the relative value of podalic version and forceps delivery in narrow pelves, advocating the forceps
515 WILSON
as a wiser procedure. He was one of the earliest members of the American Gyne- cological Society, its vice-president, and member of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia.
He died on July 14, 1889, at his coun- try house near Philadelphia.
D. W.
From the Trans. Amer. Gyn. Soc, 1889,
vol. xiv (W. n. Parish).
Also Am. Jour. Obstet., N. Y., vol. xxii, 1889.
Wilson, Henry Parke Custis (1827-1897),
Practically the founder of gynecology in Maryland, Henry Parke Custis Wilson was born on March 5, 1827, in Somerset County, Maryland, and died in Balti- more, December 27, 1897. His father's ancestor, Ephriam, came over from Eng- land and settled on the eastern shore in the early part of the eighteenth century and Henry was the son of Henry Parke Custis and Susan E. Savage Wilson.
He was educated at Princeton, whose A. B. and A. M. he held and graduated M. D. from the University of Maryland in 1851, settling afterwards in Baltimore and practising there until his death in 1897.
For some years he was the only gyne- cologist in Baltimore and was the second in his state to do a successful ovariotomy and the first there to remove the uterine appendages by abdominal section. Re- port makes him the second in the world to remove a large uterine tumor, this patient recovering. He also invented a number of instruments for use in gyne- cological surgery.
In 185S he married Alice Brewer Griffith, of Baltimore, who with five children survived him: Pioljert Taylor, William Griffith, Alicia Brewer, Emily Griffith and another daughter. The elder son became a doctor.
Wilson was a founder and president of the American Gynecological Society; the Medical and Chirurgicial Faculty of Maryland; member of the British Medi- cal Association; vice-president of the British Gj'necological Society and honor- ary fellow of the Edinburgh Obstetrical
