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“…the subject of local gossip.”
The Chancery court records of Sims’s dispute with his brother-in-law and William O. Baldwin appear to have gone missing. I am characterizing a dispute based on incomplete records, but regardless this would have been another reason Sims decided to leave Alabama.
The Weekly Advertiser (Montgomery, AL), November 3 and 17, 1852.
The image of the B.R. Jones dispensary printed in The Anarcha Quest comes from A History of Montgomery in Pictures. The image is from 1858.
Society of Pioneers of Montgomery. (1965). A History of Montgomery in pictures. Montgomery, Ala.: Society of Pioneers of Montgomery, p. 15.
“…the waters of New York…”
The dates of Sims’s travels to New York, as listed in his autobiography, are inconsistent and impossible to follow. I’ve taken some license in characterizing this period. In addition, Sims drew a distinction between Brooklyn and Manhattan in terms of its water, while claiming that the water of New York and Philadelphia was similar, and distinct from New England (where New York’s water came from). Although Sims characterized himself as a scientist, his views on the curative powers of water were wholly magical thinking.
SIMS, J. Marion, (1885). The Story of my Life, ed. by H. Marion-Sims. D. Appleton & Co: New York, p. 260.
“…interpersonally, the city doctors…”
Notably, Sims and his biographer describe the same moment differently.
SIMS, J. Marion, (1885). The Story of my Life, ed. by H. Marion-Sims. D. Appleton & Co: New York, p. 269.
Harris, S. (1950). Woman's surgeon: The life story of J. Marion Sims. New York: Macmillan, p. 124.
“…professional antagonism.”
This is directly from Blackwell.
Blackwell, E., & Blackwell, E. (1864). Address on the medical education of women. New York: Baptist & Taylor, Book and job printers, p. 5.
“…Horatio Storer…”
It’s unclear when Storer and Sims began to correspond; Sims did not attest to friendship with Storer in the same way that Storer attended to friendship with Sims, many years later. Storer’s letters, however, reveal a familiarity with Sims’s history and background—there is no reason to doubt that the two men had become correspondents and friends, and Storer’s later work will come to play a role in later chapters.
Letter from Horatio Storer to Dr. Walsh, February 1, 1922. Transcribed versions of Storer’s letters can be found at horatiostorer.net. I was unable to locate the original letters.
“…Portland, Connecticut.”
Sims’s autobiography puts this in 1852, but as indicated elsewhere in these notes the autobiography is full of inaccuracies and inconsistencies. Given Jarvis’s fondness for Anarcha, it is logical that he would have inquired after her—and Sims’s duplicity in characterizing Anarcha as having been fully cured would have begun around this time.
SIMS, J. Marion, (1885). The Story of my Life, ed. by H. Marion-Sims. D. Appleton & Co: New York, p. 260.
“Jarvis facilitated meetings…”
No record has survived of Sims’s time in Portland, but Jarvis seems as likely a vector as any for Sims’s introduction to Storer and to James and Caroline Thompson. It is of course possible that Sims encountered these persons through other contacts, but for the sake of expedience and compression I have linked them here, as they were all close geographically, and the medical world was still relatively small.
“…mental disturbance in women…”
I am giving Storer credit for having intimated early some of the ideas that he would eventually include in a comprehensive—albeit misguided—report that was published in the 1866 annual report of the American Medical Association. Storer’s work would form the underpinning (along with that of Charles Edouard Brown-Séquard, who will appear in future chapters) for clitoridectomy and normal ovariotomy—“psychological surgery”—which Sims will champion in later years.
The full text of the AMA’s annual reports can be downloaded from their website.
“…a uterine tumor…”
Caroline Thompson will go on to play an important role in the formation of Woman’s Hospital, and I will be arguing that her role, and her condition, have been distorted by Sims and his agent in New York, Henri Stuart. Although a paper would appear under Thompson’s name claiming that she had suffered from fistula, her death certificate indicates that she died of “cancerous tumor,” and given her interest in Woman’s Hospital it’s likely that her tumor was ovarian. It is possible that this is incorrect, but even less likely is the “official” story: that Thompson lobbied the New York legislature on behalf of Woman’s Hospital, claiming to be a fistula survivor, and then died of a tumor just a few years later.
The Springfield Republican (Springfield, MA), June 12, 1863, p. 2.
I’m very grateful to Maggie Humbertson with Springfield Museums for locating Caroline Thompson’s death record in American Ancestors, the database of the New England Historic Genealogical Society.
