%xx iYLcmovunn MEMORIAL 
OF 
John Osgood Stone, M.D. MEMOIR 
OF THE LATE 
John Osgood Stone, M.D. 
BY 
JOHN C. PETERS, M.D. 
Read before the New York Academy of Medicine 
on Thursday Evening, Dec. 21st, 1876. 
NEW YORK: 
G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS, 
182 Fifth Avenue. 
1877. ADDRESS. 
Mr. President and Fellows of the Academy : 
We have met together for the performance 
of a sad duty, the great sorrow of which is 
somewhat lessened by that just pride which we 
take in recording the merits of a most worthy 
colleague. 
We have assembled to pay that tribute of 
respect which we owe, and gladly evince, to 
the memory of one of our best known and 
most highly esteemed members, the late Dr. 
John Osgood Stone. 
He was an original and always an active 
member of this Academy from its inception in 
1847, and at one time its Vice-President. He 
was also one of the earliest and most liberal of 
its benefactors, and did not forget us in his 
death ; but we have much broader and higher 6 
reasons for our deep respect for his memory, 
for his whole life, from the earliest days of his 
studentship down to his sudden taking off, in 
mature years, was full of honorable and suc- 
cessful effort, and reflects great credit upon all 
who were associated with him. 
My own more intimate acquaintance with 
him dates back only about ten years, and I 
have been forced to draw largely upon the 
recollections and opinions of his older and 
better friends, Drs. Willard Parker, Isaac E. 
Taylor, James Crane, J. H. Emerson, the Rev. 
Drs. Osgood and Bellows, Messrs. Prichard, 
Jackson S. Schultz, and others, for the mate- 
rials of the sketch of his life and character 
which I now lay before you. 
He was the son of Robert Stone, of Salem, 
Massachusetts, was born in February, 1813, 
and sprang from a good and substantial 
family of the old conservative Unitarian school. 
The Rev. Samuel Osgood speaks of him as his 
long-known and cherished friend, and writes : 
“ I have known him over forty years, or since he entered the Harvard University, in the class 
after mine, or in 1829. He was a quiet, kindly, 
and industrious student, with great good sense 
and very fair abilities, without any undue or 
peculiar ambition, and one who abhorred all 
under-hand dealing.” 
Mr. William M. Prichard says : “ I first knew 
him at Cambridge, where we were classmates, 
graduating in 1833. 
“Dr. Stone had then a certain bluff sincerity, 
which he retained through life ; but he was 
always to be depended upon, and had a sym- 
pathetic and affectionate disposition. Hence 
he was popular, or more correctly speaking, 
much beloved in his class. 
“ He was not very ambitious of mere college 
distinction, but always respectable as a scholar, 
devoting himself to such studies as suited his 
tastes and purposes, rather than attempting to 
master the whole prescribed routine of the 
University.” 
After graduating from the Academical De- 
partment of Harvard College, in 1833, he 8 
entered the Harvard Medical School, and in 
commencing the study of the profession of his 
choice he showed new zeal and increased dili- 
gence, because his heart was now in his 
work. 
He also commenced his strictly professional 
studies under the preceptorship of Dr. William 
J. Walker, of Charlestown, Massachusetts, who 
was regarded as a famous surgeon in those 
parts. 
While still a student of medicine he had 
charge for a time of the States Prison and 
Alms House at Charlestown, Massachusetts, 
and performed his first amputation of the leg 
under peculiarly creditable circumstances. He 
had fairly won the love and confidence of one 
of the poor inmates, Charles Haley, by his judi- 
cious and kind attentions. When the leg was 
condemned by Drs. Thompson, Walker, and 
Valentine, Haley said, “ I have no doubt that 
young Mr. Stone can and will perform the 
operation as well as any other man, therefore I 
wish him to be the operator.” Haley’s confi- 9 
dence was rewarded, and his life was saved. 
Thus early did Dr. Stone begin to win his way 
to eminence, by skill, kindness, and justifiable 
self-reliance. 
In 1836 he received his degree of Doctor of 
Medicine from Harvard, and then labored for a 
while in association with his preceptor, Dr. 
Walker, whose professional attainments and 
surgical skill he always held in the highest 
esteem; and whose careful attention to import- 
ant minutiae, and wise readiness when sudden 
emergencies arose, always commanded his ad- 
miration. Dr. Walker is described by others as 
a man of great self-reliance and independence; a 
hearty friend and enemy; but withal somewhat 
eccentric. Dr. Stone never forgot him, and 
had many pleasant anecdotes to relate of him. 
Dr. Stone next visited Europe, and spent 
many months in walking the hospitals of Lon- 
don and Paris, where about forty years ago he 
met Dr. Willard. Parker, attended the same 
cliniques with him, and took private lessons 
from the same teachers. 10 
On his return from Europe he established 
himself in practice in this city, and devoted him- 
self with ardor to the studies and duties of his 
profession. He also identified himself with va- 
rious medical charities and scientific organi- 
zations. Among others, after serving as phy- 
sician at the New York Dispensary from 1845 
to 1847, he was chosen one of its Trustees, and 
remained in office from 1855 to 1861. In this 
position he used all his influence with the lay 
directors to improve the condition of the medi- 
cal staff, and had cause to look back with satis- 
faction to the success of his efforts. He always 
stood up stoutly for his own profession, and 
zealously guarded those rights which are so 
necessary for the full and honorable discharge 
of its functions. 
In 1848,he married Miss Catharine C. Jackson, 
of a family which had obtained great distinction 
in professional and mercantile careers in Boston. 
It is characteristic of Dr. Stone, that among 
the medical societies in which he then took 
a most decided interest was the New York 11 
Medical Association, a small and modest but 
very practical society, the meetings of which he 
attended with great regularity; for he always 
valued highly the simple and honest narration 
of matured professional experience. 
He became one of the attending surgeons of 
Bellevue Hospital about twenty-seven years 
ago, and renewed his acquaintance with Dr. 
Parker, who was also connected with that insti- 
tution. Their friendship remained unbroken 
until Dr. Stone’s death, and Dr. Parker says, 
“ it has ever been most valuable to me.” 
In November, 1849, he published a very im- 
portant paper, which is still quoted, on Ampu- 
tations and Compound Fractures, with Statistics, 
in the New York Journal of Medicine, then 
edited by Dr. S. S. Purple, President of this 
Academy. It was called out by the great 
mortality which followed upon the wounds 
received in the Astor Place riots. The advan- 
tages and disadvantages of primary and sec- 
ondary amputations both in military and civil 
practice are there handled in a masterly man- 12 
ner, and conservative surgery is elevated to its 
true position. Dr. Stone was a very careful 
operator, and his medical treatment of surgical 
cases was most painstaking. In the above arti- 
cle he does full justice to his preceptor, Dr. 
Walker, and shines forth as a surgical philan- 
thropist in no uncertain light. Everything was 
subordinated to truth and the absolute welfare 
of the patient. Nothing sensational or mere- 
tricious was allowed to influence him for one 
moment; and everthing hasty or careless was 
severely condemned. From abundant research 
he first attempted to build up a natural history 
of compound injuries and comminuted frac- 
tures from the • record of cases which had re- 
ceived no skilled attention. 
He then compiled an equally truthful history 
of the results of conservative surgery, aided by 
the elimination of many of those complications 
which render compound fractures so danger- 
ous. He strongly advised free exploratory 
incisions, not only to remove all foreign bodies, 
loose pieces and splinters of bone, and to make 13 
way for the full discharge of pus, but also large 
and deep enough to study the injury in all its 
bearings. Then only, with clear knowledge, 
did he decide whether an attempt should be 
made to save the limb, or that amputation was 
unavoidable. With the support and counsel 
of the late Dr. Cheesman, he saved the arm 
of his own brother-in-law, who was accident- 
ally shot, just above the elbow, in the Astor 
Place riots. It is said that this was the only 
limb so severely injured which was not ampu- 
tated at that time, and the only life among 
those so badly wounded that was saved. Dr. 
Stone’s coolness and self-reliance enabled him 
to accomplish this responsible and delicate 
task. But it was especially in the interest of 
the poor artizan and laborer that Dr. Stone 
made these careful studies. He appreciated 
well the ultimate consequences of the injuries 
and gun-shot wounds of soldiers and poor 
workingmen. The soldier is always animated 
by the glory which attends the reception of an 
honorable wound, and even the loss of a limb; 14 
he has also the certainty of a pension for his 
support. But the laboring man sees and keenly 
feels the loss of that employment upon which 
the comfort of his family depends, and which 
may consign them all to the alms-house. It 
was in the service of the latter that he gave all 
his thought and care. The whole reliable his- 
tory of practical surgery was ransacked in the 
cause of conservative surgery, and he helped 
bravely to sustain the rules that no limb should 
be hastily sacrificed, and that many compound 
fractures can be made to unite almost as readi- 
ly as more simple ones, provided all remov- 
able complications are skillfully eliminated. Dr. 
Stone was fully impressed with the idea that 
the operative surgeon’s art should only com- 
mence when the physician’s role had ended. If 
he had been a more selfishly ambitious and 
less conscientious man, he might have ranked 
as a very famous operating surgeon. 
In July, 1852, he published his views on the 
treatment of suppurative inflammation of the 
joints. 15 
In September, 1854, he gave us the results of 
his experience in absolutely necessary amputa- 
tions of the lower extremities. 
He published other surgical papers from 
time to time, and preserved many more 
in manuscript, which may soon appear in 
print. 
His article on Ruptures of the Heart pos- 
sesses a peculiar interest, for he was destined 
to die of something of the same kind long 
afterwards. 
About twenty years ago Dr. Stone felt 
obliged to retire from his post of surgeon to 
the Bellevue Hospital. 
His increasing private practice rendered him 
unable to give that large amount of time which 
his careful attention to surgical cases required. 
“Commencing practice at first without any spe- 
cial influence or acquaintance, he won his way 
steadily; as he gained patients his personal 
qualities made them attached friends. No one 
ever had occasion to doubt his charity or the 
kindness of his heart, although his natural con- 16 
scientiousness was backed by the most unyield- 
ing principle. Fidelity to every duty was his 
marked characteristic,” and he could no longer 
attend his hospital service satisfactorily. 
About this time he also was appointed physi- 
cian to one of the large English Life Insurance 
Companies, which, it is said, was obliged to de- 
cline insuring his life, mainly on his own repre- 
sentation of his condition. 
Twenty years ago Dr. John T. Metcalfe 
found that he had mitral valvular disease of the 
heart, but Dr. Stone’s own fears about his con- 
dition, or at least about sudden death, had 
long been allayed. 
No one else really knew that the restrain- 
ing hand of Providence had been placed upon 
him, and that the germs of that cardiac disease 
which so tragically terminated his existence 
had then been sown in that compact, muscular, 
and well-proportioned frame. His habits were 
so active, his endurance so great, and his ap- 
pearance so ruddy and healthy, that ill-health 
or any dangerous defect in his system seemed the last plea which could force him to surren- 
der any post of duty or usefulness. 
“ He had been one of the earliest members 
of the Society for the Relief of Widows and 
Orphans of Medical Men, and after serving it in 
various capacities for many years he was elected 
its President, from 1872 to 1874. Almost his 
last service in its behalf was as one of a commit- 
tee consisting of Drs. Detmold, Parker, Banks, 
Taylor, and himself, which framed the plan 
under which its beneficiary system was reorgan- 
ized last year, on much more liberal yet finan- 
cially safer principles than before. He and his 
own family had always been above all probable 
chances of want, yet he found time to think of 
the widows and orphans of his less fortunate 
medical brethren. 
“ Well known as Dr. Stone was in the medical 
profession, it was in the spring of 1866 that his 
name was most prominently brought before the 
general public by his appointment as Commis- 
sioner of the Metropolitan Board of Health, 
and subsequently he was elected President. 18 
Here he again came into association with his 
old friend, Dr. Willard Parker. His other col- 
leagues were the lamented Dr. Dalton. Dr. 
James Crane, of Brooklyn, and Jackson S. 
Schultz, Esq. It is justly claimed that the 
sturdy integrity, shrewd common sense, great 
executive ability, and directness of purpose of 
Dr. Stone materially aided his able coadju- 
tors in establishing the new board in the good 
opinion of the medical profession and of the 
public. He inspired the greatest confidence in 
the young medical men who were selected as 
Health Inspectors, for they quickly found that 
merit, and not political [or meretricious service 
of any kind], was the only way to secure his 
friendship and support.”* 
Dr. Parker says : “ His talent and integrity 
were of great avail. His ability and his ac- 
quirements, together with his fidelity to his own 
convictions of truth and justice, commanded 
our very highest esteem.” The Rev. Dr. Bel- 
lows, writes : “ His courageous and conscien- 
* Dr. Emerson. 19 
tious course, as a member of the Metropolitan 
Board of Health, did great credit to his intelli- 
gence and moral worth. He was never known 
to shrink from any disagreeable obligation, or 
to compromise his sense of duty.” Mr. Schultz 
says, “ Dr. Stone wrote the first Report of the 
Metropolitan Board of Health, that is, such 
portions of it as belonged to the Medical De- 
partment. His part is considered by good 
judges to be very able and concise, and atten- 
tion is called to it as something well worthy of 
recollection.” 
It was at this time that I became more inti- 
mately acquainted with Dr. Stone. I had 
various consultations with him about the man- 
agement of cholera in 1866 and 1867, and sub- 
sequently served with him in a committee from 
this Academy on quarantine and yellow fever. 
I visited him several times in regard to sub- 
scriptions and donations to medical libraries 
and charities. He was invariably both cour- 
teous and generous, and ever afterwards treated 
me with marked kindness, which subsequent de- 20 
mands which I made upon his time and charity 
seemed rather to increase than diminish. 
His colleague, Dr. James Crane, of Brook- 
lyn, writes: “My personal acquaintance with 
Dr. Stone began some ten years since, as Asso- 
ciate Commissioner in the Metropolitan Board 
of Health. There was something about him 
which at once secured confidence. His large, 
well - shaped head, and broad, overhanging 
brow; his plain and unpretending outward ap- 
pearance ; his somewhat austere and self-reliant 
manner; his apparent consciousness of his own 
capacities—all gave assurance of the vigor and 
breadth of his latent powers, and placed the 
mark of superiority upon him. 
“He was an honest man, and his integrity was 
unflinching and unspotted. Amply liberal and 
conciliatory in his differences with the opinions 
of others, he held to his own convictions with 
unyielding adherence. In our frequent delib- 
erations the question of mere policy never 
seemed to arise in his mind, but right and truth 
had to be the absolute conditions of all proce- 21 
dures. This was his eminent characteristic. 
Out of this moving principle came his fidelity to 
the public trusts committed to him. The con- 
sciousness of responsibility was always with him, 
ever awake, active, and impelling him up to the 
highest demands of duty. He was no laggard ; 
but with directness, promptness and energy, he 
met the claims and urgency of all occasions. 
In all our mutual relations I never knew him to 
descend to intrigue or cunning artifices, but, 
with a wise sagacity, proceeding solely upon 
the basis of the right and true, he sought to 
devise measures for the public good. 
“ He was a strong man; strong in moral 
purpose and in mental power. His highly en- 
dowed and cultured faculties, joined to a deter- 
mined will, well fitted him for the high public 
position which he then held, and not only held, 
but completely filled. 
“ He was a grand, good man, a royal citizen, 
and a faithful public servant; dignifying the of- 
fice he held, and amply satisfying the trusts 
committed to him.” 22 
In strictly professional life his most constant 
associate was Dr. Isaac E. Taylor, who says : 
“We were intimate friends for fully thirty- 
three years. I always admired him for his 
independence and decision of character, frank- 
ness of manner, his sterling integrity, high 
sense of personal honor, his great appreciation 
of the usefulness and dignity of his profession, 
and his steady maintenance of all those noble 
qualities under any and every circumstance. 
To me he was very attractive, and to his pa- 
tients I know that he had a heart full of sym- 
pathy, although that sometimes seemed hidden, 
in a degree, by his calmness of manner and by 
his great strength of mind. I do not think 
that he sought to make friends with every- 
body ; but his friends were real friends, firm 
and faithful all. He never seemed to desire to 
force himself to the highest prominence in his 
profession, but many honors came to him by 
the mute force of his character. If he had 
been more ambitious he would have attained 
the height of his desires, for his clear intellect 23 
and determined will would have enabled him 
to accomplish all he sought. He selected no 
speciality in medicine, and satisfied himself 
with the general study and practice of his pro- 
fession, in which he had few equals." His early 
training under Dr. Walker once led him to 
some preference for surgery, but the instincts 
of the pure physician were too strong in him to 
allow him to become a mere operator. 
Dr. Stone went several times with other sur- 
geons from this and other cities to aid the 
wounded after the great battles in Pennsylva- 
nia, Maryland, and Virginia. How very ac- 
ceptable his services were to all, both friend 
and foe, is well known. While in charge of the 
wounded Confederates at Williamsburg or York- 
town, they became so much attached to him 
that they begged him to remain permanently. 
He asked how they would like to have a Mas- 
sachusetts surgeon ? “ Not at all," was the reply, 
“ we would not trust any of them." To their 
great surprise, he said : “I am a Massachusetts 
surgeon." He might have added, “ and one of 24 
your most sincere and determined political op- 
ponents, but I have been no more faithful to 
Massachusetts as a citizen than I have been to 
you as a surgeon.” 
As regards his social characteristics, Dr. Em- 
erson says : “ He was hearty, cheerful, and com- 
panionable ; but very fond of reading, devoting 
much quiet thought to the books he perused, or 
rather studied. Outside of professional matters 
he enjoyed history, and particularly works on 
moral and speculative philosophy.” 
Dr. Bellows tells us “that he was a delightful 
companion and friend in social life ; full of in- 
telligent, fresh, and vigorous ideas upon things 
in general ; open to new truth; not afraid of 
the results of any honest and brave inquiries ; 
in sympathy with the progress of politics and 
theology, without being presumptuous or a de- 
spiser of experience. To the public he evinced 
a profound respect for his calling, and a great 
loyalty to his profession, with a prompt readi- 
ness to take the initiative, and bear the conse- 
quences when it was necessary to differ from 25 
his fellows, defend the unpopular side, or to in- 
troduce the claims of anything not duly recog- 
nized and respected.” 
Dr. Bellows also calls him “ that excellent 
man and good physician, who had high claims 
upon the confidence and affection of all who 
knew him well. He possessed the art, happily 
not rare in his calling, of making close friends 
of his patients. Few men were more affection- 
ate in disposition, or took a livelier interest in 
those committed to their professional care. 
His cordial smile in the sick-room was a medi- 
cine in itself. He was so honest, unaffected, 
hearty, and frank, that every word he said car- 
ried its full weight, without the least discount or 
any allowance for flattery or accommodation. 
I have seldom known a man who had a more 
genuine confidence in the safety and value of 
truth. This occasionally made him brusque, 
and sometimes aroused opposition ; but none 
could look into his gentle eyes, or watch his 
honest lips, without seeing that he meant no 
harm, and only had the necessity in his truth- 26 
ful nature of saying that which he thought use- 
ful and necessary, even if it was not immedi- 
ately palatable. 
“ His mind was strong, subtle and acute, 
and he easily attained and held a position of 
thorough respectability in his profession. Per- 
haps he would have risen to a more positive 
exceptional eminence, if he had not always been 
somewhat independent in his circumstances, or 
had possessed a more selfish and exacting am- 
bition. But he was not clamorous for honor, 
and not exclusively devoted to any speciality, 
which seems the easiest road, in our day, to 
marked distinction, such as it is. 
“ He seemed to prefer a wide accomplishment 
in all that pertained to a sound and skillful gen- 
eral practice, rather than to fame in any single 
department of medicine. He belonged in the 
highest grade of the pure physician, and it is to 
be doubted whether Dr. Stone had many supe- 
riors in that class.” 
Dr. Parker says : “In the profession he was 
always true and honorable, and as a practitioner 27 
he was surpassed by none in soundness of learn- 
ing and excellent practical judgment.” 
Such, Mr. President and Fellows of the 
Academy, was the character of the colleague 
whose untimely loss we have been called upon 
to mourn, and whose swift and almost tragic 
death produced so great a shock among us. 
It was not at all a surprise to me, when the 
materials for this memoir were placed in my 
hands, to find that I could appear in the role 
which I much prefer, viz. : that of a simple and 
faithful historian. Nothing has or can come to 
light over which we are obliged to draw the 
vail of charity ; and there has been found no 
hint or allusion to any weakness or dishonor 
about which we are obliged to remain silent. 
The story of his life is one unbroken record 
of honest and intelligent usefulness; of abso- 
lute loyalty to every duty ; and of great kind- 
ness in the sturdy maintenance of his own 
ideas of justice and truth. 
The expression that I like best of all that 
have come to me, and which the Fellows of this 28 
Academy should be the first to appreciate in its 
heartiness, and even in its apparent homeli- 
ness, is that “he was a grand, good fellow.” 
He died very suddenly on June 7th, 1876, 
aged sixty-three years. Dr. Parker, in a letter 
dated June 10th, says : “ He called upon me 
two weeks ago, and after talking over my own 
case, he spoke of his plans for the summer, and 
of his intention to diminish his labors. For 
him I anticipated many years of usefulness and 
happiness. We plan, but a Higher Power con- 
trols the execution.” 
Dr. Isaac E. Taylor, who met him very often 
both socially and professionally, says : “ He 
generally appeared in excellent health, although 
he had complained of some pain in his back a 
short time before his death. He supposed that 
he had lumbago of a rheumatic character, as 
the usual examination showed no trace of dis- 
ease of the kidneys. He never complained of 
shortness of breath, or of a sense of oppression 
in the region of the heart after exercise. Nor 
did he allude to any cardiac symptoms or to any 29 
thoracic distress, when we were in consultation 
in a difficult case of instrumental labor, scarcely 
more than a week before his sudden disso- 
lution. He was then obliged to use consider- 
able force in traction, but exhibited no signs of 
fatigue or pain, and much less of faintness or 
exhaustion.” 
He went to Newport, R. I., on Friday, June 
2d, by boat. On Sunday he took a long walk, 
and returned to New York on Monday, by 
the afternoon train. He visited some patients 
the same evening, and on the next day, Tues- 
day ; all of whom said that he looked and 
seemed remarkably well. 
On Wednesday, June 7th, he prescribed for 
patients at his office, and then went down town 
to transact some business. On his way he met 
several friends, and stopped to talk with them. 
One of them said, “ I never saw you look so 
well; ” and he replied, “ I am very well, except 
some neuralgia in my arm.” He continued on 
to an office in Wall Street, where the last 
friend who saw him alive found him, at 11.30 30 
a. m., sitting and complaining somewhat of an 
attack of pain which had seized him on his way 
down, and which still prevented him from rais- 
ing his arms without suffering. After some 
conversation he went up Wall Street to Broad- 
way, and, near Liberty Street, while crossing 
from the east to the west side, two gentlemen, 
strangers to him, saw him stagger, and caught 
him before he fell. He was quite dead when 
they grasped him. “ The finger of God touched 
him, and he fell asleep 
He had been the associate of many phy- 
sicians, but none were near to aid him. The 
Great Physician had taken him. He had many 
devoted friends, but he died in the arms of 
strangers, and none in that great throng recog- 
nized him. He had been the benefactor of 
many convicts, hospital and dispensary pa- 
tients, laborers, soldiers, widows and orphans, 
and of many obscure, suffering people, both 
white and black, loyal and disloyal, yet his 
life was demanded of him in an instant, and 
strange, but kindly, hands alone saved him from 31 
being trampled under the feet of horses or 
being crushed by heavy vehicles. 
H is death was a surprise and shock to all, 
both relatives and friends, from the nearest 
and dearest down to those who had the least 
knowledge of him. It is true that twenty-eight 
years ago he told his dearest friend that he had 
some trouble with his heart, and that his life 
would probably not be a long one. In those 
times he had a great deal of palpitation, and 
the action of his heart would be so loud and 
strong that it could be heard at some little dis- 
tance. He was then thin and pale, but some 
years afterwards he became stout, and his face 
had a rich, high color ; he ceased to complain 
of his heart, and his palpitations left him. He 
convinced himself and his wife that his heart- 
disease would be like that of his father, who 
lived to a very advanced age. He could climb 
high hills, which he was very fond of doing, 
and go quickly from the bottom to the top of a 
house without the least inconvenience or short- 
ness of breath. He often spoke to his friends 32 
about twenty years ago, about his heart, when 
it troubled him, but he had not alluded to it 
since, because it gave him no uneasiness, and 
during that long period he had no sickness 
which obliged him even to have his pulse felt. 
He was always disinclined to raise heavy 
weights, but about a year ago he lifted a pa- 
tient in bed, and as he expressed it, “ felt some- 
thing give way.” From that time onwards he 
suffered occasionally from pain in his back, 
which was never severe enough, however, to 
interfere with his work or his duties, and he 
finally decided that “ it was merely muscular or 
rheumatic.” Even this pain nearly left him last 
spring, and on the Sunday before his death he 
said that it was very slight indeed. His wife is 
sure he had not felt any anxiety about the 
condition of his heart for at least twenty years, 
and that he looked forward to a long life of 
comfort and usefulness. Still, a brother, who 
is a physician, examined him slightly about two 
years ago, and told his sister, but not his imme- 
diate family, that he had heart-disease. 33 
Such is a brief history of his honored and 
useful life ; and such the scanty record of his 
sufferings and death, perhaps from aneurism ; 
probably from heart-disease ; possibly from 
both. 
He was an upright, pure, righteous man, do- 
ing good and being good. He was a religious 
man in the deepest and highest sense of that 
term, although he was no weak believer, nor 
yet a cramped fanatic. Integrity, morality, and 
religion were the living springs of his every 
thought and act, and they were well propor- 
tioned one to another. His faith was as great 
as his works ; and his works did honor to his 
faith. He was a true, loving and forgiving 
Christian. 
You, Mr. President, and Fellows of this 
Academy, have already placed on record your 
appreciation of him by appropriate resolutions 
of sincere regret for his sudden and unexpect- 
ed decease. His friends and patients say 
they have lost not only their trusted physician 
but a dear friend. There could be no more 34 
striking and affecting testimonial of this than 
was shown in the open and unaffected grief of 
the large circle which gathered at his funeral. 
Few have seen, on any similar occasion, so 
many and such real mourners. 
His wife and three daughters survive him. 
Resolutions of the New York Academy of 
Medicine : 
At a stated meeting of the New York Academy of 
Medicine, held June 15th, 1876, a Committee, consisting 
of Drs. A. C. Post, Oliver White, and G. M. Smith, pre- 
sented the following resolutions, which were unanimously 
adopted— 
Whereas, it has pleased Almighty God to call away from 
earth the soul of our late Fellow, Dr. John O. Stone, 
Resolved, That we have heard of the death of our late 
associate with sincere regret. 
Resolved, That we cherish his memory as that of a learned 
and intelligent member of the medical profession, of an 
honest and upright man, and of a public-spirited citizen. 
Resolved, T hat we sympathize with his family in the great 
bereavement which thev have sustained. 35 
Resolved, That a copy of these resolutions be sent to the 
family of the deceased, and to each of the medical journals 
of this city. 
SAMUEL L. PURPLE, 
President. 
W. T. White, M.D., 
Secretary. 
Resolutions of the New York Society for 
the Relief of Widows and Orphans of Medical 
Men: 
At a stated quarterly meeting of the Board of Managers 
of the New York Society for the Relief of Widows and 
Orphans of Medical Men, June 21st, 1876, a Committee 
was appointed, and prepared the following preamble and 
resolutions— 
On coming together so soon after the death of our long- 
time associate and friend, John O. Stone ; and seeing the 
chair occupied by him at this Board for so many years now 
vacated forever ; we desire to place on record some expres- 
sions of the love and respect we entertain for the deceased ; 
therefore be it 
Resolved, That with unfeigned sorrow and grief do we 
lament the death of our fellow-member of this Board, and 
former President of this Society, as an almost irreparable 
loss to us and to the Society. 
Resolved, That in the death of Dr. Stone the profession 36 
in this city has had removed from its midst an accom- 
plished member of it, who was both a high-toned, courte- 
ous gentleman and a most agreeable companion. 
Resolved, That we commend to the younger members of 
the profession in this city, for their emulation, the many 
virtues of the late Dr. Stone. His love for his profession ; 
his conscientious practice of it; his solicitude for its honor ; 
his fealty to its ethics ; his liberality to all its organiza- 
tions having the well-being and elevation of its members 
for their object; his integrity in all things ; and the honor- 
able position he attained among his fellows and in the 
community where he had so long resided. 
Resolved, That our profound and heartfelt sympathy with 
his family, in the great calamity that has so suddenly be- 
fallen them, be assured to it; and that the Secretary of 
this Board be directed to transmit to it a copy of these 
resolutions. 
Resolved, That these testimonials of our love and esteem 
for our late associate in this Board of Managers be entered 
in the record of its minutes. 
O. WHITE, 
JAS. O. SMITH, 
ISAAC E. TAYLOR.