Robert King Stone
{{short description|American physician}}
Robert King Stone (December 11, 1822 – April 23, 1872) was an American physician and professor at Columbian College Medical School, the predecessor to George Washington University School of Medicine. He was considered "the dean of the Washington, D.C. medical community".[http://www.mrlincolnswhitehouse.org/inside.asp?ID=707&subjectID=2 Robert K. Stone] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120213005421/http://www.mrlincolnswhitehouse.org/inside.asp?ID=707&subjectID=2 |date=2012-02-13 }}. The Lincoln Institute{{Cite book |last=Baker |first=Jean Harvey |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=X84c9lc1wMsC&q=%22stone%22 |title=Mary Todd Lincoln: A Biography |date=2008-10-17 |publisher=W. W. Norton & Company |isbn=978-0-393-07568-7 |language=en |author-link=Jean H. Baker}}
Stone served U.S. President Abraham Lincoln during the years of the American Civil War, frequently treating maladies from the Lincoln family.{{Cite web|url=https://www.shapell.org/manuscript/abraham-lincoln-writes-pass-for-his-doctors-wife-on-day-of-his-assasssination/|title=Abraham Lincoln Writes Pass to South for Dr. Robert Stone's Wife on Day of His Assassination {{!}} Shapell Manuscript Foundation|website=Shapell|language=en-US|access-date=2019-04-16}} Stone was present at Lincoln's deathbed and at his autopsy in 1865.{{Cite web|url=https://www.archives.gov/exhibits/eyewitness/html.php?section=13|title=Robert King Stone – Assassination of President Abraham Lincoln, 1865|publisher=National Archives and Records Administration|access-date=2009-10-15}} Stone was one of 14 doctors to attend President Lincoln at his death bed.{{Cite journal|last=Bredhoff|first=Stacey|date=March 2007|title=Eyewitness Account of Dr. Robert King Stone, President Lincoln's Family Physician|url=https://www.socialstudies.org/system/files/publications/articles/se_710299.pdf|journal=Social Education|volume=71|pages=99–104}} Stone was the only witness to his condition at the military tribunal, and his testimony has been shared by the National Archive of the United States.{{Cite web|url=https://rememberinglincoln.fords.org/node/1196|title=Dr. Robert King Stone Testimony|website=rememberinglincoln.fords.org|access-date=2019-04-16}}
Early life and education
Stone was born December 11, 1822, in Washington, D.C., the son of engraver William J. Stone and his wife Elizabeth Jane Lenthall.{{Cite book|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_iRPAAAAYAAJ&q=Robert+King+Stone&pg=PA298|title=Eminent and Representative Men of Virginia and the District of Columbia in the Nineteenth Century: With a Concise Historical Sketch of Virginia|date=1893|publisher=Brant & Fuller|pages=298–299|language=en|chapter=Robert King Stone}} Lenthall was the daughter of John Lenthall one of the architects of the United States Capitol.
He received his medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1845 and visited major hospitals of London, Paris and Vienna before starting his own medical practice in the United States in 1847. Stone specialized in eye problems and was professor of Ophthalmic and Aural Surgery.{{Cite journal |last1=Boritt |first1=Gabor S. |author-link=Gabor s. boritt |last2=Borit |first2=Adam |date=1983 |title=Lincoln and the Marfan Syndrome: The Medical Diagnosis of a Historical Figure |url=http://muse.jhu.edu/content/crossref/journals/civil_war_history/v029/29.3.boritt.html |journal=Civil War History |language=en |volume=29 |issue=3 |pages=220 |doi=10.1353/cwh.1983.0002 |pmid=27652392 |s2cid=11907189 |issn=1533-6271|url-access=subscription }}
At the time of his death, from apoplexy, he was one of the most prominent physicians in Washington, D.C. He was survived by his wife, Elizabeth J. Stone, who died in 1892.[http://planning.dc.gov/DC/Planning/Planning%20Publication%20Files/OP/HP/Pending%20Landmarks/Westory%20Building.pdf Westory Building]{{Dead link|date=May 2019 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}. United States Department of the Interior. National Park Service. planning.dc.gov
Legacy
A collection of his papers is held at the National Library of Medicine in Bethesda, Maryland.{{cite web|url=http://ulus.nlm.nih.gov/stone118|title=Robert King Stone Papers 1853-1857|publisher=National Library of Medicine}}{{dead link|date=April 2018 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }} Stone's "lost" report of the Lincoln autopsy was discovered in 1965 and examined by John K. Lattimer.{{Cite journal |last=Lattimer |first=John K. |author-link=John K. Lattimer |date=1965-08-02 |title=Autopsy on Abraham Lincoln: Retrieval of a Lost Report |url=http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?doi=10.1001/jama.1965.03090050025007 |journal=JAMA |language=en |volume=193 |issue=5 |pages=349–350 |doi=10.1001/jama.1965.03090050025007 |pmid=14313888 |issn=0098-7484|url-access=subscription }} Some of his notes of the autopsy were displayed at the Fenimore Art Museum in Cooperstown, New York.{{Cite web |last=Beardmore |first=Matt |date=2015-03-04 |title=In Lincoln Exhibit, Witnesses to History |url=https://intransit.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/03/04/in-lincoln-exhibit-witnesses-to-history/ |access-date=2022-05-31 |website=New York Times |language=en-US}}
References
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Further reading
- {{Cite journal|last=Crellin|first=J. K.|date=February 1979 |title=Robert King Stone, M.D., physician to Abraham Lincoln|journal=IMJ. Illinois Medical Journal|volume=155|issue=2|pages=97–99|pmid=33141}}
- {{Cite book|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GPssAAAAYAAJ&q=Robert+King+Stone&pg=PA1111|title=A Cyclopedia of American Medical Biography: Comprising the Lives of Eminent Deceased Physicians and Surgeons from 1610 to 1910|last=Kelly|first=Howard Atwood|date=1920|publisher=W.B. Saunders Company|language=en|chapter = Stone, Richard French|pages = 1110–1111}}
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Category:19th-century American physicians
Category:People of the American Civil War
Category:People associated with the assassination of Abraham Lincoln
Category:George Washington University faculty