Edward Warren

Background

Edward was born on January 22, 1828, in Tyrrell County, North Carolina, United States. He was the son of Dr. William Christian Warren and his wife Harriet Alexander.

Education

After finishing boarding school in Fairfax County, Virginia, Edward attended the University of Virginia and received his Doctor of Medicine degree from Jefferson Medical College (now Thomas Jefferson University), Pennsylvania, in 1851.

Career

Warren advocated the establishment of a state medical examining board during his years of practice in his home town of Edenton, North Carolina. In 1854-1855, he practiced medicine in Paris, France, and in 1856, he won the Fiske Fund prize for "The Influence of Pregnancy on the Development of Tuberculosis." In 1857 he became editor of the Medical Journal of North Carolina.

Warren was a professor of medicine at the University of Maryland in 1860-1861, and in 1861, he edited the Baltimore Journal of Medicine. When the Civil War began, he volunteered his services to the Confederate Army.

Early in the war, he cited the need for more medical officers in the Confederate Army. He himself served as North Carolina surgeon general and medical inspector for the Confederacy. As a member of the Confederate States Medical Examining Board, he voted against the relaxation or absence of standards for the practice of medicine in the South.

In 1863, Edward Warren wrote "An Epitome of Practical Surgery for Field and Hospital," which was used by every Confederate medical officer. After the war, he reorganized the Washington University Medical School in Baltimore and directed the school from 1867 to 1872. In 1872, he helped to found the Baltimore College of Physicians and Surgeons, and the following year he was chief surgeon in the service of Ismail Pasha in the Middle East.

Achievements

• During Edward Warren's medical service of the Confederacy, he held such positions as chief surgeon of the navy of North Carolina, medical director of the Department of the Cape Fear, chief medical inspector of the Department of Northern Virginia, and surgeon general of North Carolina.
  
  He helped establish two Baltimore Hospitals and the nucleus of the Johns Hopkins Medical School.

Works

More photos

• book

  • An Epitome of Practical Surgery for Field and Hospital 1863
  • A Doctor's Experiences in Three Continents ... 1885

Politics

Warren was a Whig who originally opposed secession.

Connections

Edward married Elizabeth Cotton Johnstone in 1857. Warren was survived by two daughters. His two sons had died in infancy.

Father:

William Christian Warren

Mother:

Harriet Alexander Warren

Wife:

Elizabeth Cotton Johnstone

Friend:

Jean-Martin Charcot

Warren had several noted teachers and made a special friend of Jean-Martin Charcot, who years later helped him to begin a practice in Paris.

References

• Biographical Dictionary of the Confederacy
  1977