Page 126

“…a mariner who sails without a compass…”

Holt’s medical school thesis, “An Inquiry into Hereditary Redisposition, of Mind, and Body,” is held in digitized form at the UAB Archives, University of Alabama, Birmingham, in Birmingham, Alabama.

“Dr. James Berney…”

“James Berney,” Emmet B. Carmichael, Alabama Journal of Medical Science, Vol. 7, No. 1, 1970, pp. 111-12. A copy is held by the UAB Archives, University of Alabama, Birmingham, in Birmingham, Alabama.

“Dr. Carnot Bellinger…”

Bellinger’s medical school thesis, “An Inaugural Thesis on Hernia,” is held in digitized form at the UAB Archives, University of Alabama, Birmingham, in Birmingham, Alabama. This material appears on p. 18.

“Dr. Alexander McWhorter…”

Some Doctors, Drugs, Druggists and Dentists of Montgomery, 1820-1920, Lela Irwin Legare, 1961, p. 12, an unpublished book of medical history in Alabama, held at the UAB Archives, University of Alabama, Birmingham, in Birmingham, Alabama.

“…already rich with slaves.”

Details on William O. Baldwin are drawn from the R.G. Dun credit reports that were compiled on him during his lifetime. The reports indicate that at 35, Baldwin was married and doing a very successful business with a plantation, property in town, and enslaved people.

The R.G. Dun & Co./Dun and Bradstreet Collections are held at the Baker Library/Bloomberg Center at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. They cannot be photographed; researchers are permitted only to take notes on the materials.

Needless to say, I don’t think the story reprinted here indicates Baldwin’s good nature.

Some Doctors, Drugs, Druggists and Dentists of Montgomery, 1820-1920, Lela Irwin Legare, 1961, p. 90, an unpublished book of medical history in Alabama, held at the UAB Archives, University of Alabama, Birmingham, in Birmingham, Alabama.

“…attempting to kill a circus performer…”

Read, N. C., Read, D., & Read, J. C. (2005). Deep family. Montgomery, AL: NewSouth Books, p. 38.

“…moving into banking.”

“William Owen Baldwin,” Emmet B. Carmichael, Annals of Medical History, p. 529. A copy is held by the UAB Archives, University of Alabama, Birmingham, in Birmingham, Alabama.

“…attended Jefferson in Philadelphia…”

From Hardy Vickers Wooten: Diaries, 1813-1856, pp. 47-48, held at the Alabama Department of Archives and History in Montgomery, Alabama.

“…he circulated essays…”

A selection of the original manuscripts of Hardy Vickers Wooten is held at the Alabama Department of Archives and History in Montgomery, Alabama.

“…the passing of the Great Comet…”

From Hardy Vickers Wooten: Diaries, 1813-1856, p. 99 (additional astronomical descriptions on 103-04), held at the Alabama Department of Archives and History in Montgomery, Alabama.

“…a woman’s inner break and crumbling…”

I have taken some liberty here. First, nothing is known about what the doctors might have talked about before the fistula experiments began. As well, Sims is specific about the date of his first experiment, January 10, 1846 (See “…begun in 1846…,” above), and the record is specific that Matthew Fontaine Maury first observed the breakup of Biela’s come three days later, on January 13, 1846 (see “On January 13, 1846…,” above).

Regardless, it seems highly likely that a figurative association between the two events would have occurred to someone like Wooten, even if it cannot be documented.