A MEMORIAL SKETCH 
* 
OF 
THE LIFE AND CHARACTER 
OF THE LATE 
JOHN FOSTER JENKINS, A. M., M. D , 
OF YONKERS, N. Y., 
BY 
GEORGE JACKSON FISHER, M. D , 
OE SING SING, N. V 
[reprinted from the transactions of the medical society of the STATE. OF NEW YORK, 
BY ORDER OF THE MEDICAL SOCIETY OF THE COUNTY OF WESTCHESTER, N. Y.] 
SYRACUSE, N. Y.: 
SMITH & BRUCE, PRINTERS AND BOOK BINDERS. 
1884. A MEMORIAL SKETCH 
OF 
THE LIFE AND CHARACTER 
OF THE LATE 
JOHN FOSTER JENKINS, A. M., M.D., 
OF YONKERS, N. Y., 
BY 
GEORGE JACKSON FISHER, M. D., 
OF SING SING, N. Y. 
[reprinted from the transactions of the medical society of the STATE OF NEW YORK, 
BY ORDER OF THE MEDICAL SOCIETY OF THE COUNTY OF WESTCHESTER, N. Y.] 
SYRACUSE, N. Y.: 
SMITH <fc BBUCE, PRINTERS AND BOOK BINDERS. 
1884. A Memorial Sketch 
OF THE 
LIFE AND CHARACTER 
OF THE LATE 
John Foster Jenkins, a. M„ M. D., 
OF YONKERS, N. Y. 
By George Jackson Fisher, M. D., of Sing Sing, N. Y. 
Communicated to the Medical Society of the State of New York, by the Medical 
Society of the County of Westchester, N. Y. 
For a period of no less than a quarter of a century it was 
my good fortune to enjoy an intimate and uninterrupted ac- 
quaintance with the subject of this brief sketch. I admired 
him from the commencement of our acquaintance to the hour 
of his death. Indeed, my admiration amounted to an ardent 
love for him, which never abated by time, but ever increased 
as we journeyed on in life together. We were within five 
months of being the same age. We were near neighbors, only 
thirty minutes apart, our respective towns almost in sight of 
each other, and as our tastes in many particulars followed 
nearly parallel lines, it is only natural that we came to love 
each other very devotedly. Time and again through all 
these years we interchanged visits, spending whole nights to- 
gether in rooting among our bibliographic treasures, compar- 
ing our rarities, and in exhibiting our latest finds and gets. 
When it became obvious that death was hovering over my 4 
dear friend, and that soon his cold finger would be laid upon 
him, my heart was heavy and my soul was filled with grief. 
To write a memorial sketch of a friend may be a grateful 
and a pleasant duty ; to me it is, however, a sad and painful 
task. Alas! dear friend, I requested thee to perform this 
kindly act for my friends, in the almost certain event of being 
the first to say farewell, and bid adieu to this troublesome, but 
intensely interesting and charmingly beautiful world. 
John Foster Jenkins was born at Falmouth, in the State of 
Massachusetts, the fifteenth day of April, 1826, and died in the 
city of Yonkers, in the State of New York, the ninth day of 
October, 1882. 
The Hon. John Jenkins, and Harriet, his wife, were the 
parents of a large old-fashioned New England family, consist- 
ing of no less than ten children, nine of whom were boys, and 
one a girl. John Foster, the subject of this memorial, was the 
first born son. But few particulars of his boy-life are known, 
or are of sufficient importance to be recorded here. At the 
age of twelve he was sent from home to attend the boarding 
school of the Rev. Mr. Leach, of Roxbury, Mass., at which 
school he made such proficiency in his studies that he was 
enabled to enter thd junior class at Brown University, R. I., 
in the autumn of 1842. After remaining about two years at 
this University, he quitted it and entered Union College, New 
York, where he graduated in the arts in the year 1845. 
It was probably during his collegiate course at Union, in 
Schenectady, that he determined to make medicine the profes- 
sion of his life, for we find him immediately after his gradua- 
tion engaged in a preliminary course of medical reading, as a 
pupil in the office of Dr. Alexander M. Vedder, a practical, 
learned, and eminent physician of that city. 
Dr. Vedder was a graduate of the Medical Department of 
the University of Pennsylvania, and it was probably through 
his influence that young Jenkins was induced to attend the 
lectures of that institution, then, as now, one of the most cele- 
brated seats of medical instruction in America. In the year 
1848 he received his degree of Doctor of Medicine from this 
famous' school, and yet, not content with his acquisitions in 
medical science, he devoted the following year in attendance 
at an extra course of didactic and clinical lectures at the 
Harvard Medical School in Boston. 5 
Possessed of an active mind, a clear strong intellect, a quick 
and keen perception, ample opportunities, solid fundamental 
culture, and an ardent and earnest enthusiasm, one would say 
that he was now fully prepared to engage at once in the active 
practice of his profession. All these qualities and attainments 
were not enough, however, to satisfy the exalted ideal which 
Dr. Jenkins had conceived to be necessary to prepare the 
novice in medicine to assume the grave responsibilities and 
duties involved in the practice of an art where human life so 
often depends on skill and judgment, and death so often results 
from the want of them. Hence, the better to prepare himself 
for his life-work, he betook himself to Europe to expand the 
sphere of his professional education, to increase his store of 
knowledge by practical observation, to imbibe the spirit of 
eminent masters, and to ripen and strengthen his judgment. 
From May, 1849, to May, 1856, he practiced in the city of 
New York, with the exception of the time occupied in making 
the tour above mentioned. This, his first tour to Europe, was 
rather brief. He embarked November 25th, 1850, at the port 
of New York, on the sailing vessel, Duchesse D' Orleans, for 
Havre, where he arrived December 14th; returning from 
London on the Northumberland, which Sailed from thence July 
17th, 1851. 
While abroad, he spent the greater part of his time in Paris, 
attending the lectures, the cliniques, and the hospitals of that 
renowned centre of medical and surgical science and art. 
During his residence in Paris, he took occasion to make little 
pilgrimages to various places of note in France, going at one 
time as far south as Montpelier. The first of the great inter- 
national expositions, or “World’s Fairs,” was then in progress 
in the city of London, which was a matter of so much interest 
that he devoted a portion of his precious time to a careful 
inspection of its multitudinous objects of utility and art, which 
were fully appreciated by him, as he ever had a quick eye for 
all objects of delicate refinement and artistic embellishment. 
In his after-life, while engaged in active practice, he never 
entered a house which contained an article of vertu that 
escaped his observation, his intelligent and refined criticism, 
or that failed to afford him pleasure; were it a painting, an 
engraving, a ceramic or a bronze, a carving or a rare book. 
He spent but six months in England, though it was a part of 6 
his plan to remain much longer, and also to visit both Ireland 
and Scotland before his return to America. This plan was 
suddenly changed by the circumstance of his having unex- 
pectedly met in London the late Dr. Horace Green, of New 
York city, who discouraged his protracted stay in Europe and 
induced him to hasten home and enter at once into the prac- 
tice of his profession. Whether any overtures were then 
made by Dr. Green for young Dr. Jenkins to become his 
assistant, I am not informed, but certain it is that soon after 
the return of these gentlemen to New York, we find Dr. 
Jenkins associated with Dr. Green, with whom he continued 
for a year or more. Dr. Horace Green at that time was a 
very distinguished specialist in the treatment of diseases of 
the air passages, by the “amputation of the tonsils,” the 
“truncation of the uvula,” and the “topical application of 
strong solutions of the nitrate of silver,” by probangs, tracheal 
catheters, &c. Notwithstanding the pecuniary temptations 
which a specialty in that day offered to almost anyone who 
would choose his favorite organ of the human body—a day 
when a less number of pre-emption claims had been entered, 
or squatter sovereignty resorted to than now—Dr. Jenkins’ 
frank and conservative nature led him to regard the human 
organism as a unit, to look to the general constitution in the 
treatment of disease, in short to avoid narrow and lop-sided 
views and to settle down as a general practitioner. 
On the tenth day of October, in the year 1854, Dr. Jenkins 
married Miss Elizabeth Siccard David, who belonged to a 
highly respectable old Philadelphia family. 
In the month of May, 1856, Dr. Jenkins located in what was 
then the flourishing village of Yonkers, as a general prac- 
titioner of medicine, surgery and obstetrics. Possessed of all 
the qualifications to which I have already alluded, together 
with a remarkably fine personal appearance, tall and dignified, 
with genial, courteous and charming manners, it is not surpris- 
ing that he made an easy and speedy entrance into the favor- 
able notice of the best people and society of that community. 
He was not long in becoming established on a solid footing, in 
gaining the confidence and in becoming the favorite physician 
of many of the most intelligent and influential families of 
Yonkers and its vicinity. 
It was about this time that I had the pleasure of making his 7 
acquaintance, soon to become warmly attached to him, to 
admire and to love him dearly. He was indeed:* 
* * * * “generous, honest, just and true ; 
Noble in mind, and in his person lovely, 
Dear to my eyes, and tender to my heart.” 
The war of the rebellion had not been long in progress before 
that stupendous organization in furtherance of humanity—the 
United States Sanitary Commission—was set in successful 
operation. It was fully organized in June, 1861. At this time 
Dr. Jenkins was well established in a good and lucrative prac- 
tice. Being a staunch Unionist, and possessed of the strongest 
benevolent sentiments and humane impulses, it is only natural 
that he immediately felt it to be his duty to retire from private 
practice and engage head, heart, and soul, in the work of the 
Sanitary Commission. Accordingly in August, 1861, we find 
him in its active service as hospital visitor, and holding the 
position of Associate Secretary of the Commission, in which 
-capacity he continued to work, most efficiently, until May, 1863. 
On the retirement of Frederick Law Olmsted from the very 
honorable and responsible office of General Secretary of the 
United States Sanitary Commission, Dr. J. Foster Jenkins was 
appointed his successor. He performed the arduous duties of 
this important office in the most prompt, thorough, and satis- 
factory manner to the month of May, 1865, when, on account 
of failure of his health, from over-strain and nervous exhaus- 
tion, he was obliged, though very reluctantly, to relinquish his 
post; a position in which he labored with enthusiastic delight, 
from a sense of the great importance of the work and the 
immense value of its results. As many persons of the present 
day may not be acquainted with the precise nature and extent 
of the duties of this office, I will quote them, as recorded in 
Stille’s “History of the United States Sanitary Commission," (8°, 
Phila., 1866,) p. 504 et seq. 
* Note—The artotype portrait of Dr. Jenkins, which the Medical Society of the 
;County of Westchester has furnished for these extra copies of the Memoir, is an 
excellent likeness, but it is not satisfactory from an artistic point of view. Mr. 
Edward Bierstadt, of New York City, made every possible effort to procure the 
original negative, taken by Kurtz, which has been, most unfortunately, broken or 
lost ; and it is much to be regretted that he also failed to obtain the loan of a very fine 
crayon portrait of Dr. Jenkins, in possession of his widow. Mr. Bierstadt has pro- 
duced the best possible result obtainable from a negative which he took of an imperial 
photograph. This explanation is due to the friends who may see this Memoir, as well 
.as to the Society. 8 
“ The General Secretary was charged with arranging plans 
for insuring the greatest efficiency of the Commission in all its 
departments, with making due preparation for campaigns and 
battle-fields, with the task of accumulating proper supplies at 
points near the army to meet its current wants, and a reserve 
stock in addition, to provide against emergencies ; with devis- 
ing the best means of getting these supplies forward when 
needed, and with determining the proper methods of relieving 
the wounded, and of transporting them to general hospitals. 
Besides this, he was invested with the power of selecting all 
the subordinate officers of the Commission, a task which, when 
the anomalous nature of their position in the army is con- 
sidered, involved a verv serious responsibility. The multi- 
farious character of his duties will be better understood when 
it is stated that he was not only expected to enlighten the board 
as to the measures which should engage its attention, but was 
held responsible also for the due performance of its work in 
all its various departments, and for the character of the 
agents he employed. In the organization of the Commission’s 
service, there were two Associate Secretaries, one for the East 
and the other for the West, each charged with the details of 
the work in his own department, and each reporting directly 
and constantly to the General Secretary. So, also, there was,, 
during the first three years of the war, an office called the 
Chief of Inspection, whose special province it was to superin- 
tend the work of inspecting camps and hospitals. He also 
received his instructions from the General Secretary, and 
reported to him. The Statistical Bureau also was under bis 
direct supervision. The headquarters of the Eastern and 
Western Departments respectively, in charge of the Associate 
Secretaries, were established at Washington and Louisville. 
The offices at these places were important centers of activity, 
for not only was the immense business of meeting the requisi- 
tions for supplies made by the Inspectors and Relief Agents 
employed in the different Armies in the field and in the hospitals 
transacted there, but connected with them were various 
Bureaus, each charged with a specific department of the Com- 
mission’s work. Thus both at Washington and at Louisville, 
there were under the jurisdiction of the Associate Secretaries, 
a Supply Bureau charged with the movement of supplies, and 
a Special Relief Department, with its Hospital Directory,. 
Pension Agency, and Homes and Lodges. 9 
“The number of Agents on the Commission’s roster varied 
at different periods from one hundred and fifty to seven hun- 
dred. The average number constantly employed was about 
three hundred.” 
The total amount of money and value of materials employed 
by the Commission has been approximately estimated at the 
enormous sum of fifteen millions of dollars. This estimate 
but poorly represents the value of the service rendered in 
mitigating the horrors of our civil war. The entire Board 
gave their time and services gratuitously, and many hundreds 
of laymen and surgeons spent their time and performed their 
labor in the cause without money and without price. 
Stille, at p. 503, says: “Mr. Olmsted remained in the service 
of the Commission until its general policy had been shaped 
by the events of the war, and its system of internal organiza- 
tion finally adopted. He resigned in September, 1863, and 
was succeeded by Dr. J. Foster Jenkins, a gentleman who, 
with great purity of personal character, and indefatigable zeal 
in the Commission’s service, combined the important advantage 
of a thorough training for the special duties of his position, 
having held for nearly two years the very responsible office of 
Associate Secretary of the East. Ill health, resulting from too 
close an application to the duties of his office, forced him to 
abandon it in the spring of 1865, when Mr. John S. Blatchford, 
who had previously distinguished himself in the superintend- 
ence of the Relief work undertaken by the Associates in Boston, 
was elected his successor.” 
The President of the Commission, the Rev. Dr. Bellows, on 
the retirement of Mr. Olmsted and the promotion of Dr. Jen- 
kins to the office of General Secretary, said: “ He is promoted 
for his prudence, faithfulness, and high medical and general 
intelligence.” 
I had a personal opportunity on more than one occasion to 
observe the efficiency of Dr. Jenkins’ executive ability in the 
work of the Commission. Well do I remember going to 
Washington in May, 1862, in response to an urgent telegram 
from him, to fit out the transport steamer Elm City, and to 
proceed with all possible dispatch as her so-called “Medical 
Director” down the Potomac and on to Yorktown, for the 
purpose of transporting sick and wounded soldiers from the 
recent battle-field of Williamsburgh, Va., to hospitals at the 10 
North. In less than two hours I had made my hasty arrange- 
ments for leaving home and was on my way to the Capital. 
I immediately reported to Dr. Jenkins, who greeted me as if I 
had come to do him a personal favor, for he took the struggle 
for the preservation of the Union and all that pertained to it 
so much to heart that whatever aided the cause, and, partic- 
ularly, whatever was done in the name of the Sanitary Com- 
mission for the relief of our suffering soldiers was as pleasing 
to him as if he was one of the latter. Having shown me the 
Commission’s ample stores, of every conceivable thing that the 
most liberal humanity could furnish for any great emergency; 
and having directed me to select all that could be wanted for 
such an expedition—supplies for not less than four hundred 
men—it was delightful to witness the ease and facility with 
which he had everything promptly shipped and all carefully 
inventoried in his book of records. Those were stirring times. 
Energy and alacrity were required to transact the urgent and 
almost unlimited amount of work that was to be done with 
dispatch; the laborers of every grade must be earnest and 
energetic men and those who never tire of doing. No one 
was more seriously impressed with the truth of all this, and 
no one worked more cheerfully or more to the purpose than 
did our enthusiastic friend. 
After his retirement from the service of the Commission, he 
re-established himself in the city of Yonkers and commenced 
anew the practice of his profession. He engaged in the work 
with renewed energy, and took the liveliest interest in all that 
was going on in the medical world. He attended with com- 
mendable regularity the meetings of the several medical socie- 
ties of which he was a member, whether they were far or near, 
nearly always taking an active part in the discussions and often 
contributing to their interest by cases derived from his private 
practice and observations founded on his own personal expe- 
rience. 
The exalted estimation in which he was held by his pro- 
fessional brethren cannot, perhaps, be better understood than 
by an enumeration of the several positions of honor and trust 
which he was elected to occupy: 
•i. Physician of the St. John’s Riverside Hospital, (Yonkers.) 
2. Surgeon of the Board of Police of the City of Yonkers, 
(from the time of its organization to the time of his death.) 11 
3. Senior Warden of St. Paul’s Parish, Yonkers, (for twelve 
years.) 
4. Hospital Visitor and Associate Secretary of the United 
States Sanitary Commission for the East, (from August, 1861 r 
to May, 1863.) 
5. General Secretary of the United States Sanitary Com- 
mission, (from September, 1863, to May, 1865.) 
6. President of the Yonkers Medical Association, (one of 
its founders.) 
7. President of the Medical Society of the County of 
Westchester. 
8. Vice-President of the New York Obstetrical Society. 
9. President of the Medical Society of the State of New 
Y ork. 
10. Permanent Member of the American Medical Associa- 
tion. 
11. Member of the American Public Health Association. 
12. Corresponding Fellow of the New York Academy of 
Medicine. 
13. Member of the German Medical Association, (New 
York City.) 
14. Member of the American Social Science Association. 
In 1869, Dr. Jenkins, accompanied by his wife and two young 
children, made his second voyage to Europe. To this delight- 
ful trip I have often known him to refer. He availed himself 
of important letters of introduction, tendered him by several 
distinguished American medical gentlemen, to many of the 
most eminent members of our profession in Europe. He was 
thus enabled to make the personal acquaintance of a large 
number of doctors of note, was frequently invited to dine with 
them, and had unusual opportunities to become familiar with 
their special ideas and methods in all the departments of med- 
icine and surgery. On this occasion he visited hospitals, and 
other medical institutions, ransacked the book-stalls, and had a 
good time generally. He also took occasion to attend the 
meetings of the Obstetrical Society of London, and several 
other medical associations. 
Dr. Jenkins was an active and highly esteemed member of 
the Medical Society of the State of New York, and had the 
distinguished honor of being elected President of that body, on 
the 21 st day of June, 1877. It has been a matter of surprise, 12 
and quite inexplicable to some persons, that he declined to 
perform the duties of the office. It was not on account of 
any indifference which he felt towards the Society, for he 
appreciated the honor as any rational man most certainly 
would. The following brief note was written by him to the 
Secretary: 
Yonkers, January n, 1878. 
Wm. Manlius Smith, M. D., Secretary of the Medical Society of 
the State of New York: 
Dear Sir—Please communicate to the Society my grateful 
appreciation of their confidence, as shown in their last election 
of President. But I feel compelled to decline acceptance of 
the office. 
With heartiest wishes for the prosperity of the Society, 
I am very truly yours, J. Foster Jenkins. 
In the year 1875, by a resolution of the Society, the time- 
honored season of holding the annual meeting was changed 
to the third Tuesday of June, and the meeting in 1876 was held 
at that time, and again in 1877, both of which are now believed 
to have been strictly legal. At the meeting in June, 1877, the 
Society changed the time to the third Tuesday in January. 
This action was taken in ignorance of the fact that a law of 
the State, (passed Feb. 1, 1876,) provided that no change 
should be made of the time of holding its annual meetings 
without notice of intention to change having been given, at a 
previous regular annual meeting. The result was found to be, 
that the action for change was technically irregular and illegal, 
and that, therefore, the meeting in January, 1878, would not be 
a legal annual meeting of the Society, in consequence of the 
Society having never been informed of this law, and hence not 
having complied with it. 
Owing to this muddle, Dr. Jenkins, who was in fact legally 
elected President of the Society, entertaining a doubt as to the 
legality of his election, took legal counsel, and, having received 
the opinion that he was not the President, de facto, he acted 
upon this opinion and declined to attend the meeting and to 
perform the duties of that office. The Vice-President, Dr. 
Saunders, presided at the sessions of the January meeting in 
1878. Dr. Jenkins and his legal*adviser were both wrong; he 
was legally elected, though the meeting at which he should have 
presided was technically illegal. 1 have considered it neces- 
sary to introduce this somewhat lengthy explanation of Dr- 13 
Jenkins’ non-attendance at the meeting, and his non-perform- 
ance of the duties of the President, in order that he should 
stand properly on record in this rather anomalous state of 
affairs. Honesty, conscientiousness, and sensitiveness, pre- 
vented him from taking the slightest risk of error. Incom- 
plete knowledge of the law misguided the attorney and 
deprived the doctor of the honor of presiding at the Society’s 
sessions, and deprived the Society of his dignified presence. 
Dr. Jenkins was a wide-awake, stirring and industrious man. 
The demands of an extensive general and obstetrical practice, 
his frequent attendance at the meetings of the several medical 
associations above enumerated, his fondness for study, and his 
love of society, left him but little time for medical authorship. 
His contributions to the literature of our profession were not 
very extensive, though by no means unimportant. The fol- 
lowing is a complete list of his papers, as far as I possess them 
or have any knowledge of what he has written: 
I. Puerperal Mania, has it any Connection with Toxaemia? 
(Reprinted from the American Medical Monthly for November, 
1875,) pp. 7, New York, 1857. 
II. Report on Spontaneous Umbilical Hemorrhage of the 
Newly-born. (Reprinted from the Transactions of the Amer- 
ican Medical Association, Vol. XI., p. 263-318,) pp. 58, Phil- 
adelphia, 1858. 
III. Relations of the War to Medical Science. The annual 
address delivered before the Westchester County (N. Y.) 
Medical Society, June 15th, 1863. (Published by request of 
the Society,) pp. 16, New York, 1863. 
IV. Tent Hospitals. Read before the American Social 
Science Association, May 21, 1874. Illustrated with figures, 
pp. 25, Cambridge, Mass., 1870. 
The title of the first of these tractates, “ Puerperal Mania; 
Has it any Connection xvith Toxeemia f ” may sound very oddly 
to the younger members of the profession at this time. The 
fact is, this paper was written when far less was known of 
renal pathology than at present. Not many years before Dr. 
Jenkins wrote this, Gooch gave the following rather ambiguous 
explanation of the etiology of this affection, viz.:—“ The cause 
of puerperal mania is that peculiar state of the sexual S37stem 
which occurs after delivery.” Only ten years before this 
article appeared, Dr. J. Y. Simpson (Edinburgh Monthly Jour, of 14 
Med. Sci., 1847, P- 288,) having recognized the fact of the pres- 
ence of albumen in the urine of patients who were attacked 
with puerperal convulsions, failed to discover that the true 
cause of eclampsia was due to uraemic poisoning. The true 
light began, however, to dawn upon his thoughtful mind, as 
may be seen from the following observation in his article here 
alluded to :—“ Perhaps in puerperal convulsions, &c., produced 
by albuminuria, the immediate pathological cause of the 
nervous lesions is some unascertained but poisoned state of 
the blood. Was there a morbid quantity of urea in the blood ? ” 
About the time Dr. Jenkins’ article was written the attention 
of the profession was first called to the toxic influence of urea 
retained in the blood, chiefly through Braun, of Vienna, and 
Duncan, of Edinburgh.* Dr. Jenkins puts this very direct 
and pertinent question:—“ Do the facts in our possession 
justify the opinion that the form of acute mania, which occurs 
within the puerperal month, is sometimes attributable to a 
toxsemic condition of the blood ? I do not mean pyaemic in- 
fection, as in cases of uterine phlebitis.” * * * “ May not 
an impure condition of the blood, in puerperal women, be one 
cause of mania, as it is well known to be of convulsions in the 
same class? To a larger number of observations than we at 
present possess, must we look for a definite answer to this 
question. Should such observations, as this inquiry invites, 
determine the fact that a morbid state of the blood, whether 
depending on an excess of urea, on caseine, or on some un- 
ascertained poison, does sometimes induce mania in puerperal 
women, we may understand better than we can now the remark 
of Gooch, ‘ The cause of puerperal mania is that peculiar state 
of the sexual system which occurs after delivery'. ” 
The second paper of Dr. Jenkins, on Spontaneous Umbilical 
Hemorrhage, is quite an exhaustive monograph on the subject, 
embracing fifty-eight closely printed octavo pages. This 
valuable essay was communicated to the American Medical 
Association, and published in the eleventh volume of its Trans- 
actions, 1858, p. 263-318. One hundred and seventy-eight 
* Dr. Braun’s belief, as declared in his treatise, is simply this:—That the convul- 
sions caused by uraemic intoxication in acute Bright’s disease, and puerperal eclampsia, 
are identical. This proposition was strongly defended by Frerichs, Litzmann, 
Wieger, Oppolzer, and others. It was powerfully assailed by Marohal, Siebert, 
Depaul, Levy, Scanzoni, and many others. 15 
cases are here tabulated and carefully analyzed. The frequency 
of its occurrence, its pathology and treatment, and the litera- 
ture of the subject are all well considered. Previous to this 
essay there had been some articles published. In 1850, Dr. 
John Manley read an essay on this subject before the Aberne- 
thian Society of London, in which the particulars of only 
twelve cases are given. In 1852, a century after the record of 
the first case of the kind was made by Dr. G. Watts, Dr. 
Francis Minot, of Boston, read a very valuable paper on hem- 
orrhage from the umbilicus in new-born infants, (Am. Jour. 
Med. Sci., Vol. XXIV, p. 310,) based on an analysis of forty-six 
cases. In 1853, Dr. George A. Otis published an article on 
the subject. (Virginia Med. and Surg. Jour., Vol. II, p. 49.) 
His deductions were based on forty-nine cases, excluding those 
counted twice. The next statistical essay on this subject is by 
Dr. Stephen Smith, of New York, (N. V. Jour, oj Med. and the 
Collateral Sciences, N. S., Vol. XV, p. 76, July, 1855.) with a 
table of seventy-nine cases, done in a far better manner than 
any previous attempts. 
Dr. Jenkins’ monograph embraces one hundred and seventy- 
eight cases, a considerable number of which had never 
before been published. It will long be sought as the best 
resume of the subject in the English language. The article is 
reviewed quite extensively in the American Journal of the 
Medical Sciences, N. S., Vol. XXVII, p. 433, 1859. 
The third pamphlet of Dr. Jenkins is the annual address 
which he delivered as president before the Medical Society of 
the County of Westchester, June 16th, 1863, on the “ Relations 
of the War to Medical Science.” It was in the middle of the 
struggle for the preservation of the Union, and when Dr. 
Jenkins was in the service of the United States Sanitary Com- 
mission, that this address was written and delivered. Its pur- 
pose was to exhibit the valuable work which the Commission 
was engaged in doing, and to tell us the practical lessons which 
had been learned by the experiences of the medical and 
sanitary officers in the army and in the Commission, in every- 
thing which relates to the causes and prevention of disease, as 
well as the mitigation and treatment of the same. It is a noble 
address, and will repay any one for its reading at the present 
time. 
The fourth and last of his published essays is on Tent Hos- 16 
pitals. Dr. Jenkins was still in the active service of the Com- 
mission and surrounded with the din of war, and the groans of 
the dying, both from wounds and disease, when he wrote this 
practical paper. Every word of these twenty-six closely- 
printed pages savor of the earnest, practical and experienced 
medical observer that he was. It abounds in learning and 
wisdom. The following quotations will show the aim of the 
essay. 
“The Department of Health of this Association, (Am. Social 
Science,) when inviting the preparation of a paper upon tent 
hospitals desired, I presume, to elicit a discussion as to the 
applicability of tents to the hospital requirements of civil 
society, rather than to ask further consideration of their uses 
for the temporary shelter and treatment of disabled men in 
time of war. 
In a thousand growing towns and incipient cities of the 
United States, to say nothing of those larger cities whose 
petrified embodiment of old errors in hospital construction 
yield steadily their harvests of disease and death, there is 
to-day an urgent need of better provision than exists for the 
care of such members of the community as, disabled by sick- 
ness or accident, most fitly rely on the local hospital to raise 
them from the class of dependents and consumers into that of 
helpers and producers.” ***** 
“ I hope to show in this paper that tents are not less suited 
to satisfy the requirements of permanent civil hospitals than 
to meet the exigencies of war ; that warmth and light and pure 
air can be secured to their occupants, and that so they satisfy 
the prime necessity of hospital construction, viz: that in them 
the largest number of sick may be restored to health in the 
shortest possible time.” 
Dr. Jenkins has brought a strong array of facts to prove that 
in many instances what are usually considered to be fine hos- 
pitals, both general and special, notwithstanding that they may 
have been equipped with all the “modern improvements” and 
sanitary appliances, nevertheless exhibit in their results very 
unsatisfactory mortuary statistics. “ Hospitalism ” or the lurk- 
ing infection which clings to large establishments for the 
treatment of the sick, in spite of all reasonable care and 
cleanliness, is a matter of very grave consideration. Much 
valuable information and many useful suggestions can be 
derived by consulting this practical and able paper. 17 
With all his facilities for instruction, his ample means of illus- 
trating every subject pertaining to medicine, both by his exten- 
sive library, and his large practice, he never had a medical 
student in his office. 
In the latter part of the year 1878, Dr. Jenkins found himself 
in very ill health and scarcely able to attend to his professional 
duties. This induced him to consult several eminent physicians 
in the city of New York. His symptoms indicated so serious 
a disorder of the renal organs, that he was advised to quit his 
practice at once and go to Southern Europe, and there to give 
himself up to the most perfect rest of body and mind. Accord- 
ingly, in October, he made his third voyage across the Atlantic, 
and proceeded without delay to Mentone, and other celebrated 
health-stations along the northern border of the lovely Medi- 
terranean Sea. The beneficial effect of six months of residence 
in this genial climate, and the enjoyment of entire freedom 
from care and labor, was very manifest, and so highly encour- 
aging that Dr. Jenkins resolved to return to his home and 
resume his practice again. He was an enthusiast and scarcely 
understood the term moderation, so he entered upon his work 
with renewed energy and zeal, being apparently unconscious 
of the insidious inroads which his malady was making upon 
his constitutional strength and power of endurance. 
Seven and a half years previous to his death, Dr. Jenkins 
formed a copartnership with Samuel Swift, M. D., of Yonkers, 
with a view to lightening the burdens of his large general 
practice, and particularly to avoid the wear and tear of night 
practice. This association with Dr. Swift continued to the 
time of our friend’s death. 
For nearly three years after his last return from Europe, 
Dr. Jenkins kept very steadily at his work, and was at last 
confined to his house but nine weeks before the solemn hour 
arrived when he bade an everlasting farewell to the scenes of 
this life, and a final adieu to his beloved family and friends. 
This sad event occurred on Monday, October 9, 1882. 
Dr. Jenkins was a gentleman in the fullest sense of the word ; 
polite, refined, eminently pleasing in his manners, brilliant in 
conversation, pure and cultured in speech as in thought, ever 
mindful of the comfort and enjoyment of others, generous and 
hospitable, kind and sympathetic, cheerful and happy, reverent 
and devout, loyal and earnest in his attachment to the church 18 
of his choice—the Protestant Episcopal—strong and unwaver- 
ing in his confidence and faith in the Christian plan of salva- 
tion, he died, as he had lived, a beautiful example of an upright 
man and a Christian gentleman. 
When Dr. Jenkins died all Yonkers mourned. For a quarter 
of a century he had been constantly growing in the estimation 
and affection of that great community and its adjacent villages. 
He was widely known and universally beloved. The medical 
profession of Westchester County felt very keenly the loss 
which it had sustained by his untimely death. The physicians 
of New York City, and of the State, and many others in vari- 
ous parts of the country, were saddened by the death of this 
lovely man. To a very large number of friends he still lives, 
for 
“To live in hearts we leave behind, 
Is not to die.” 
His funeral was largely attended by members of our pro- 
fession. All that is mortal of John Foster Jenkins, M. D., now 
lies in the rural cemetery at Piermont, N. Y., on the western 
slope of the beautiful Hudson, a river whose scenery was to 
him a charm and a perpetual source of delight. 
His wife and two grown up children, John Foster, and Mary 
Siccard, survive him. Dr. Jenkins delighted in his home, 
which was always cheerful, pleasant and happy, the result of 
mutual affection and refined taste. 
Numerous resolutions of sorrow and sympathy were ten- 
dered to the family by the medical societies of which he was 
an honored member, and many brief and touching memorial 
sketches of his useful life appeared in the current newspapers 
and medical periodicals. The Yonkers Medical Association, 
as an expression of the exalted estimation in which it held 
him, promptly and unanimously changed its name to The Jen- 
kins Medical Association, and at its first meeting under this new 
and very appropriate name Dr. Swift read a brief eulogy of 
their late associate. 
The present memorial sketch is written in response to a 
request made by resolution of the Medical Society of the 
County of Westchester, which directs that it be communicated 
to the Medical Society of the State of New York, with a view 
to its publication in the Society’s Transactions. 
Dr. Jenkins, like most medical gentlemen, was not a very 19 
good financier. He certainly had a lucrative practice and 
must have received in the aggregate a large sum of money. 
This to him, however, was a secondary consideration ; his gen- 
erous and liberal disposition was incompatible with the rigid 
economy which is required to accumulate money. He had 
the wisdom and foresight, however, to secure a life insurance 
in several companies, amounting to twenty-five thousand dol- 
lars, which was promptly paid soon after his death. 
Aside from his household effects, his works of art, with 
which his home was handsomely garnished, his chief item of 
personal property was his large and valuable medical library. 
This was his special pet and pride. He was a sensible biblio- 
phile, and not a bibliomaniac, as those who are very fond of 
accumulating books on any special subject are too apt to be 
called. If a man collects books that relate to his own profes- 
sion, ancient as well as modern, and peruses them to the extent 
of his otherwise leisure time, and thus stores his mind with 
facts of value, traces the historical line of evolutionary descent, 
through all the stages which present methods in science have 
had to pass, from the original suggestion of an idea—the pro- 
toplasmic hint, as it were—has he wasted his time or his money 
in so doing, even though his executors fail to realize the full 
amount of the original cost of his library, after he has ceased 
to use it, whether it be on account of old age or untimely 
death? Dr. Jenkins was an earnest and devoted student of 
medical literature. His reading table was almost overladen 
with the current medical magazines, hospital reports, trans- 
actions of medical societies, retrospects, and medical reviews, 
both American and foreign. His medical library afforded him 
one of his chief sources of delight. His pleasant rooms were 
walled about with cases and shelves, bending under the weight 
of treatises relating to every subject embraced in the broad 
domain of the medical sciences. While his library was amply 
stocked with the most recent works representing the latest 
advancement of our science and art, he was not unmindful of 
the value of the older and even the ancient classical literature 
of medicine. He had collected whole series of works on 
anatomy, surgery, botany, obstetrics, etc., to illustrate the 
progress of these departments through the past ages. His 
library was also rich in works on medical history, bibliography 
and biography. While his main purpose was to store his mind 20 
with practical knowledge, he possessed the true spirit and 
enthusiasm of a refined and cultured scholar. 
I feel that I am in a large measure responsible for having, 
unwittingly, beguiled my friend into a mild but harmless form 
of bibliomania for antiquarian medical books. At first, and for 
many years, he made himself merry at my expense in poking 
fun at my stock of “old medical bruisers,” my “ancient and 
obsolete trash,” and at last spent many an hour himself in wad- 
ing through booksellers’ catalogues of antique works, in search 
of new treasures, and, in time found himself sorely perplexed 
for space wherein to shelve his ponderous tomes of classic 
medical literature. It was, however, an innocent species of 
mania. It brought an ample compensation in the way of 
pleasant diversion for spare hours, and an interesting and 
elegant culture otherwise unattainable. Perhaps it would be 
better for the profession if this sort of diversion was more 
frequently resorted to. More than once I have said, though 
my books were burned as a funeral fire,—gentle reader do not 
conclude from this that I am an advocate for cremation of the 
body, or of incineration of books,—they have served a purpose 
to me, quite equal to their commercial value. I shall never 
'forget with what zest we pursued our historical and biograph- 
ical researches, with a view to ascertain the period and state 
of times in which our authors flourished, the prevailing medi- 
cal opinions of their era, their contributions to theory and 
fact; in short, the nature and extent of their labors and even 
the particulars relating to their personalities. Thus we learned 
the story of our profession, and traced the gradual evolution 
of the science and art of healing. 
It is a sad scene to witness the sale of a deceased friend’s 
library. One almost feels that it is a sacrilege to enter into 
competition, to snatch up and carry off, like literary vultures, 
the treasures of one so recently among us. Five days were 
occupied by Bangs & Co., (Feb. 12-16, 1883,) in selling the 
eighteen hundred lots embraced in the catalogue, of over a 
hundred pages, of the medical library of the late J. Foster 
Jenkins, M. D. It brought scholars and librarians from all 
over the land, and yet the books, in the main, sold very low. 
It is not known what this library cost its owner, it is presumed 
to have been not less than ten thousand dollars, which is prob- 
ablv not far from the right figure. It brought in gross 
$3,940.98. 21 
Dr. Jenkins never intimated what disposition he wished to 
have made of this splendid library. Had his finances admitted 
of it, I have no doubt that he would have bequeathed it to the 
medical profession of Westchester County. When the im- 
mense and valuable medical library of the late Dr. Davidson, 
of Breslau, Germany, embracing 5,450 lots, was to be sold at 
auction in 1881, Dr. Jenkins appealed to several wealthy 
gentlemen for funds, with a view of purchasing it entire, and 
making it a library for Yonkers in particular, and Westchester 
County medical men in general. In my opinion, far the most 
gracious and appropriate memorial which could have been 
devised by his professional friends, would have been the pur- 
chase of his medical library, and the making of suitable provi- 
sion for its use, increase and preservation, that his name, thus 
associated, could have been transmitted from generation to 
generation, and that his life and character might be kept in 
fresh remembrance, as a fine example of what it is not impos- 
sible for any physician to attain to, and an encouragement to 
any member of our profession to become erudite as well as 
skillful, to become cultured as well as learned, to be ever 
active in the pursuit of knowledge and in the performance of* 
duty, to live, and not barely exist, to ever 
“ Remember, life is but a shadow. 
Its date the intermediate breath we draw ; 
Ten thousand accidents in ambush lie, 
To crush the frail and fickle tenement, 
Which, like the brittle hour-glass measuring time, 
Is often broke ere half its sands are run.”