(The
following are the personal edited research notes of Michael Echols, the
source of which may or may not be completely documented)
William Alexander
Hammond
HAMMOND, William
Alexander, physician, born in Annapolis, Maryland, 28 August, 1828.
He was graduated at the medical department of the University of the
city of New York, and entered the United States army in 1849 as
assistant surgeon, with the rank of 1st lieutenant. In October,
1860, he resigned to accept the professorship of anatomy and
physiology "in the University of Maryland, but at the beginning of
the civil war he again entered the army and was assigned to the
organization of general hospitals in Hagerstown, Frederick, and
Baltimore. Afterward the United States sanitary commission urged his
appointment as surgeon-general of the army, and in April, 1862, he
received this commission with the rank of brigadier-general. He
instituted radical changes in the management of his office,
established the army medical museum by special order, and suggested
the plan of the "Medical and Surgical History of the Rebellion."
Charges of irregularities in the award of liquor contracts were made
against him, and he was tried by court-martial, and dismissed from
the army in August, 1864. He at once removed to New York, where he
settled in the practice of his profession, and made a specialty of
diseases of the nervous system. In 1867-'73 he was professor of
diseases of the mind and nervous system in Bellevue hospital medical
college, and then was elected to a similar chair in the medical
department of the University of the city of New York. He remained
there until 1882, when he became one of the founders of the New York
post-graduate medical school, and has since delivered lectures on
his specialty in that institution. Dr. Hammond has also delivered
lectures in the medical department of the University of Vermont, and
in 1870 became physician at the New York state hospital for diseases
of the nervous system. In 1878 a bill was submitted to congress
authorizing the president to review the proceedings of the
court-martial, and, if justice demanded, to reinstate Dr. Hammond.
This measure was passed by the house unanimously, and by the senate
with but one dissenting vote. In August, 1879, it was approved by
the president, and Dr. Hammond was restored to his place on the
rolls of the army as surgeon-general and brigadier-general on the
retired list. Besides contributing to current medical literature, he
founded and edited the " Maryland and Virginia Medical Journal," was
one of the originators of the "New York Medical Journal," and
established the "Quarterly Journal of Psychological Medicine and
Medical Jurisprudence," becoming its editor. His medical works in
book-form include "Physiological Memoirs" (Philadelphia, 1863);
"A Treatise on Hygiene,
with Special Reference to the Military Service" (1863); "Lectures on
Venereal Diseases" (1864);
"On Wakefulness, with an Introductory Chapter on the Physiology of
Sleep" (1865); "On Sleep and its Derangements" (1869); "Insanity and
its Medico-Legal Relations" (New York, 1866); "Physics and
Physiology of Spiritualism" (1870); "Diseases of the Nervous
System," which has been translated into French and Italian (1871);
"Insanity in its Relation to Crime" (1873); "Lectures on Diseases of
the Nervous System," edited by T. M. B. Cross (1874);" Spiritualism
and Allied Causes and Conditions of Nervous Derangement" (1876;
reissued as "Certain Forms of Nervous Derangement," 1880); "Treatise
on Insanity in its Medical Relations" (1883); and "On Sexual
Impotence in the Male" (1883). He has also edited "Military,
Medical, and Surgical Essays," prepared for the United States
sanitary commission (Philadelphia, 1864), and translated from the
German, Meyer's "Electricity in its Relations to Practical Medicine"
(New York, 1869; new ed., 1874). Dr. Hammond is the author of
various novels, including "Robert Severne; his Friend and Enemies"
(Philadelphia, 1867); "Lal" (New York, 1884); "Dr. Grattan" (1884);
"Mr. Oldmixon" (1885); "A Strong-Minded Woman, or Two Years After"
(1886); and "On the Susquehanna" (1887).
