An appeal to the benevolent on behalf of the Women's Hospital in the State of New York / [C.R. Agnew].

  • Agnew, Cornelius Rea, 1830-1888.
Date:
1881
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An appeal to the benevolent on behalf of the Women's Hospital in the State of New York / [C.R. Agnew]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    few years later Dr. J. Marion Sims came to New York, and operated upon difficult cases of a peculiar class of affections to which woman is exposed, and had such extraordinary success that the attention of the medical profession was soon enlisted, and a movement was inaugurated for the establishment in this city of a Hospital exclusively devoted to the treatment of dis¬ eases peculiar to woman, where he could teach practically his new surgical methods. The house No. 83 Madison avenue was rented for the Hos¬ pital in May 1855, and it had been open but a few days when all its beds, about thirty in number, were filled. The managers at once perceived that the institution should be enlarged and that its importance had not been overestimated. The same year the Woman's Hospital Association was regularly organ¬ ized, with six surgeons and physicians, the incorporators being the following ladies ; Martha Codwise, Margaret R. Astor, Y. E. Hoffman, Sarah M. Webster, Charlotte O. Le Roy, and Sarah P. Doremus. At the first anniversary of the Hospital, held at Clinton Hall on February 9, 1856, it was stated that patients had journeyed painfully from many parts of the country to this promised haven of relief, and had not been disappointed. The expenses were reported to have been about $4,500, and the receipts only about $3,000. In the course of a speech made at this meet¬ ing Mr. Peter Cooper said : Mr. President, it is our privilege and our duty to see that suffering woman shall not longer groan in vain. If the importance of this institution can be properly placed before the public, its permanence and enlargement will be in¬ sured. From its beginning I have anxiously watched its progress, and the more I have seen and thought of it, the more I am convinced of its necessity and utility to this community and to the country at large.They will be found ready to aid a charity, the success of which affects the welfare, more or less, of every family in the State.