Background
Joseph was born on September 6, 1833 in Liberty County, Georgia, United States, the son of Rev. Charles Colcock Jones and Mary (Jones) Jones, and younger brother of the historian Charles Colcock Jones.
Joseph was born on September 6, 1833 in Liberty County, Georgia, United States, the son of Rev. Charles Colcock Jones and Mary (Jones) Jones, and younger brother of the historian Charles Colcock Jones.
His preliminary education was obtained by private tuition, and in 1853 he obtained the degree of A. B. at the College of New Jersey (Princeton). Three years later he was granted the degree of M. D. by the University of Pennsylvania.
His teaching career began in 1858 with his appointment to the chair of chemistry in the Savannah Medical College. He was for a time professor of natural philosophy and natural theology in the University of Georgia at Athens and later professor of chemistry in the Medical College of Georgia at Augusta.
With the outbreak of the Civil War he joined the Confederate army in the cavalry service, but after six months was transferred to the medical service, with which branch he was identified throughout the war, attaining the grade of surgeon-major.
Following the close of the war he settled in New Orleans. In 1872 he was given the chair of chemistry and clinical medicine in the University of Louisiana, which he held until his death. He was also appointed president of the state board of health and served from 1880 to 1884. This was before the day of federal control of quarantine, and Jones found himself immediately the center of a feud with the harbor and railroad interests in his efforts to protect the city and state from contagious disease. A four-years' fight resulted in a court decision that the imposition of a quarantine was a legitimate exercise of police powers.
His early work on physiological chemistry was reported in his doctoral dissertation, "Physical, Chemical and Physiological Investigations upon the Solids and Fluids of Animals" (July 1856), "Digestion of Albumen and Flesh" (May 1856).
Joseph Jones's career was a thankless struggle for the sanitary improvement of New Orleans. He was keenly interested in the study of diseases of the Southern states and wrote a large number of papers in relation to them. Other papers reflect his interest in the prehistoric anthropology of the same region. Most famous his works: "Contributions to the Natural History of Specific Yellow Fever", "Observations on the African Yaws and on Leprosy".
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Besides being an active member of the Louisiana State Medical Society he held membership in the Medical Society of Virginia and an associate fellowship in the College of Physicians of Philadelphia.
Jones was married in 1858 to Caroline S. Davis of Augusta, Georgia, who died in 1868. Two years later he married Susan Rayner Polk of New Orleans, daughter of the Bishop of Louisiana, who with five children survived him when he died, in New Orleans. His eldest son became a physician but preceded his father in death.
