John George Adami and John McCrae

18 Pages·2006·1.3 MB·English

by  The Meier's

John McCrae
History Of Pathology
Symposium 45 John George Adami
International Academy of Pathology
Montreal pathologists
20 September 2006
Oslerianmedical educators
Montreal, Quebec
British imperialists
Canadians in the Great War
Frederick A. Meier, MD, CM
From Colony to Dominion
The “Scotch”of Ontario
Strathcona’sMcGill
Edwardian Montreal
Canadian Army
Grandson of the Great
Immigration [1849-1850]
Thomas McCrae –Entrepreneur
John Eckfield–School Superintendent
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Son and Brother
David McCrae Thomas McCrae
(1845-1930) (1870-1936)
• Mill owner • Osler’s 3rdresident
• Livestock breeder • Text/Systemsuccessor
• Soldier • Prof. of Medicine JMC
McCrae of the Gunners Academic Education
“Best drilled” Highland Cadets age-14 • Guelph Collegiate Institute/William Tytler
Bugler to 1stLt Wellington Field 15-23
Company Captain Varsity Co, QOR 16-19
• University of Toronto/Robert Ramsay Wright
Lt commanding D Battery, RCA 27-28
* BA Natural Science 1894
Served to Major 16thBatt. RCA 29-32
* Summer MBL, Woods Hole, MA 1894
Lt.Col, 2nd-in-com. 1stBrig. RCA 41-42 * Fellow in Zoology 1894-97
Asthma and Temperament
• Asthma initially associated with farm
• Exacerbations during Toronto years
• Barking cough persisted through active life
• Sanguine faces: mobile features, amiable
• Choleric complexion: ruddy, irritable
• Sanguinary temperament ascendant in Montreal
• Choleric temperament dominant after Ypres
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Sentimental Education Imaginative Writing I
• Published from adolescence
• Death of Alice McRae (Spring 1890) • Most produced when medical student
• Teaching at OAC (1892-1893) • Influenced by Boys’Own, Carlyle,Tennyson
• Remarkably consistent themes and imagery
Imaginative Writing II
• Fiction: Imperial adventure
• Non-Fiction: Vivid descriptions of animals
Interweaving of comic/tragic
• Poetry: Preoccupation with death
Desire for oblivion
Affirmation of immortality
Medical Education
• University of Toronto (1896-1897)
* Apprenticing with Henry Howitt, Guelph
* Externingat Robert Garrett Hospital, MD
• Toronto General Hospital (1898-1899)
* Summer on Osler’s JHH service (1899)
• McGill University (1899)
* Governor’s Fellowship in Pathology
* Delayed by Boer War service
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McCrae In Africa (1900)
• Fellow battery commander, EWB Morrison,
to be brigade commander in France
• Visited Kipling: “high priest of it all”
• KenhardtColumn marched across Karoo
• Delagoa Bay Railway Campaign-
Balmoral, Belfast, Lydenburg
McCrae’s Pathology
Department (1901-1904)
J.G. Adami Chair; RVH
Wyatt Johnson Osler’s old assistant; MGH
Maude Abbott Curator, Medical Museum
Osler Klotz Other Fellow (from ’02)
McCrae’s Pathology Practice McCrae’s Teaching Positions
• 1901-1902 417 autopsies • Lecturer in Pathology, McGill 1902-14
• 1902-1903 succeeds Johnson at MGH • ‘Railroad’Professor of Path.,UVM 1903-12
• 1903-1909 combines with Klotz • Lecturer in Medicine, McGill 1909-14
• 1910-1914 works for L. Rhea (MGH)
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The Saturday Demonstrations McCrae’s Teaching Style
• McCrae and Klotz presented
• Logical, brief exposition
• Adami commented
• Effective, copious use of specimens
• ‘The simple exposition of the
• Merging lecture with demonstration
pathology of disease’
• Rhetoric of memorable, grotesque contrasts
McCrae’s Medical Practice
• Sat FRCP (London) in 1904
• Associate in Medicine at RVH
• More patient contact, night calls
• Insistence on accurate records
‘I have never refused any work
that was given to me to do’
Medical Pathological
Outdoor clinics Laboratory supervision
Ward attending/ Post mortems/
clinical teaching demonstrations
House calls Meetings/papers
Editing (for TMcC) Reviewing (for Klotz)
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The Krausmanian Club
J. McCrae E. Archibald
O. Klotz C. Palmer Howard
W.T. Turner W.W. Francis
“Dr. McCrae of This Club” The Pen and Pencil Imperialists
Andrew MacPhail Neuropathologist/
• Military Institute litterateur
• Pen and Pencil
Stephen Leacock Economist/humourist
• Shakespearean
• University
John MacNaughton Classicist/courtier
Tea and Tundra:
With Earl Gray to Hudson’s Bay
(1910)
• From Norway House (L.Winnipeg) to
Churchill (via York Factory)
• Leo Amery of the Timesreporting
• J.McCexpedition physician and story teller
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McCrae’s Medical Writing Interest in Infectious Diseases
• Tuberculosis and typhoid
• Writing for Osler/McCrae System 1907-11 • Scarlet fever and other childhood infections
• Condensing Adami’sPathology 1909-11 • Zoonoses e.g. glanders
• Reviewing for Klotz’s AmJMedSci 1911-14
Nona: Life Imitating Art
of Henry James
• McCrae brothers visit XVII International
Medical Congress (London, 1913)
• Nona Gwyn, Tom’s sister-in-law, WO’s niece,
staying with Oslers
• Lord Strathcona(act 93) hosts 1300
• Shooting in Scotland with Cushings
• Lady Osler later writes that JMcChad proposed to
Nona there and was refused
McCrae’s War Begins
• Embarked October 1914
• Winter on Salisbury Plain
• Poor pay, cramped quarters, no alcohol
• Into the Line March 1, 1914
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In Flanders Fields - I
• March 10-12 NeuveChapelle(Haig)
• April 6: moved to Oudezele(Smith-Dorrein)
• April 20: moved to NE Ypres salient
• April 22: first gas attack [on North Africans]
Canadian counter attack fails [50% casualties]
• April 24: second gas attack breaches Cdnline;
McCrae’s Battery prevents breakthrough
In Flanders Field - II
• April 25: Canadian casualties 6,000/10,000
• May 2: Lt Alexis Helmerkilled by a direct hit;
fragments of Helmer’sbody collected;
Major McCrae conducts service
In Flanders Fields - III
• McCrae’s 2 May journal entry:
“Lt H. was killed at the guns.
His diary’s last words were: ‘It has quieted a little
I shall try to get a good sleep’.
I said the Committal service over him.”
• Cosgrave (officer) and Allinson(gunner) agree:
InFlandersFieldwritten after Helmer’sdeath-
2 or 3 May 1915
• May 9: McCrae’s Battery withdrawn from lines
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Lt. Col. In Charge of Medicine
Number 3 Canadian General
Hospital(McGill)
• Durbar tents/ ruins of Jesuit College
• Dannes-Camiers/Boulogne
• From June 17 1915: 30-40 consults/day
• Debredement, drainage, saline lavage
• Trench food, bronchitis, trench fever
• War nephritis, shell shock, soldier heart
Illness and Anger Bitterness and Disillusion
Autumn 1917:
Oct 1916: cough forces change in quarters • Passed over for Hospital command
Nov1916: hospitalized:bronchitis/pleurisy • Irritated by integration of Portuguese
intoCanadianHospital
Apr 1917: obsessed by Germans, politicians
January 1918:
Dec 1917: extended vituperation to
• ‘Silent , asthmatic, moody’
French Canadians and RC’s
• Received appt.as Consultant
day of onset of fatal illness
Pneumococcal Pneumonia
and Meningitis
Jan 24 - Gram stain-positive sputum
Jan 26 –Meningeal signs
Jan 28 –Death, age 45
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Pursuit of a Victorian Ideal:
Versatile Excellence
• Soldierly duty and adventure
• Medical service and skill
• Defeated by mechanized, mass war
A Man Among Men:
An Accurate Epitaph
Pathologist
Poet
Physician
Soldier
An Exotic Lancashire Man:
John George Adami
‘The Englishman Italianate’
12 January 1862 –29 August 1926
Father Mother
Also JGA Sarah Leech
Cambridge
Born in France Sister of Mayor of Manchester
Montreal Polyglot hotelier Mother of 5 sons, 4 daughters
Medical ancestors Sister of Professor of Materia
Wartime London
Medicaat Manchester
Liverpool
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