York after a stormy passage of forty-four days.
In 1853 he married Emily Jane Andrews, and had two sons, Henry and Robert Tracy. His freedom from the daily care of private practise afforded him much opportunity for association with his family and for journeys to Europe that gave him much pleasure and were of much value to his children. He was professor of pathologic anatomy from 1847 to 1854 and Shattuck professor of morbid anatomy from 1854 to 1879, the latter chair being endowed by Dr. Shattuck as a proof of his personal regard and esteem and for the medical ability of Dr. Jackson. He was a member of the local medical societies and was especially prominent as a member of the Medical Improvement Society.
All his writings of import are on questions of pathology, and include many articles, published largely in medical journals. His most valuable contribution to the medical profession is "The Warren Anatomical Museum" (1870), not, as its title might suggest, simply a catalogue, but a storehouse of the results of many of Dr. Jackson's studies in morbid anatomy.
In 1851 he made an extensive trip to Europe, especially with the object of studying the museums and meeting again his fellow medical students, many of whom had won important positions in the medical world. Aside from his medical studies he was always deeply interested in natural history, and especially in the anatomy of the lower animals as well as in their diseases. He was probably the first medical man in Boston to turn his attention to the study of the diseases of the lower animals.
He died Jan. 6, 1879, of pneumonia. Though never robust, he worked hard to the end of his life and was in his beloved laboratory the day his last illness seized upon him.
A biographical notice of Dr. Jackson by his life-long friend and kinsman, Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, was published Jan. 9, 1879, in the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal. In this notice Dr. Holmes says, "He was not a microscopist. What he knew he knew thoroughly, but he never pretended to have the slightest knowledge beyond what his honest, naked eyes could teach him," and later, "His look penetrated like an exploring needle, and many a tympanitic fancy of careless observers has collapsed under its searching scrutiny."
Jackson, John Davies (1834–1875)
John D. Jackson, the biographer of Ephraim McDowell (q. v.) was born in Danville, Kentucky, December 12, 1834, and died in his native town, December 8, 1875, not completing the forty-first year of his life.
He was the eldest child of John and Margaret Jackson, both natives of Kentucky, and received his education at Centre College in Danville, receiving the A. B. degree there in 1854. After taking one course of medical study at the University of Louisville he went to Philadelphia, where he graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1857 with a thesis on "Vis Conservatrix et Medicatrix Naturae." Dr. Jackson practised in Danville until the breaking out of the Civil War when he entered the Confederate Army with the rank of surgeon, and served throughout the war, going home to resume practice in 1865.
During the succeeding ten years of his life he was a student of medicine, collected an ample private library, made frequent journeys to the medical centers of the country and one trip to Europe (1872) in order to keep abreast of the times. He published an article on "Trichiniasis" in the American Journal of the Medical Sciences in 1869, and he helped found the Boyle County Medical Society, besides practising surgery. In 1873 he translated Farabeuf's "Manual on the Ligation of Arteries," published by Lippincott, Philadelphia, and his "Biographical Sketch of Dr. Ephraim McDowell" in the Richmond and Louisville Medical Journal, 1873, a well written article of some six thousand words. It was in this year he got a systemic infection from an autopsy wound, and during his convalescence developed pulmonary tuberculosis, succumbing after a long illness, December 8, 1875. During the last two years of his life he devoted much labor and time in vindicating the claims of McDowell to priority in the operation of ovariotomy and in establishing a suitable memorial.
At the time of his death Dr. Jackson was first vice-president of the American Medical Association and before this body he advocated the removal of Dr. McDowell's remains from the neglected family burying-ground at "Traveler's Rest," the former country home of Governor Shelby, to Danville, a project that had its fruition in 1879 when Dr. S. D. Gross dedicated the McDowell monument at the home of the pioneer ovariotomist.
"In personal appearance Dr. Jackson was above the medium height, very erect and rather slender. He had fine bluish-grey eyes, a firm expression about the mouth and a forehead indicative of intellect. In his habits he was systematic, and in all his engagements he was promptness itself."
