John Warren was a Continental Army surgeon during the American Revolutionary War.
Background
John Warren was born in Roxbury, Massachussets, the son of Joseph and Mary (Stevens) Warren, and a descendant of John Warren who arrived in Salem on the Arbella, June 12, 1630. Joseph Warren was a farmer in easy circumstances who was killed by a fall from a tree in October 1755. He was brought up by an intelligent mother.
Education
John, the youngest of four brothers, entered Harvard College at the age of fourteen, supported himself by his own exertions, became a good classical scholar, acquired an interest in anatomy and formed a club for its study, and was graduated with high rank in 1771. For the next two years he studied with his brother Joseph, twelve years his senior, a successful practitioner in Boston. The honorary degree of M. D. was conferred upon him by Harvard College in 1786.
Career
He then went to Salem, where he associated himself with Dr. Edward Augustus Holyoke. Here he added to his knowledge of medicine and began to establish himself in practice. The events of 1773, however, caused him to join the patriots as a surgeon in Colonel Pickering's regiment. According to tradition, Warren took an active part in the Boston "Tea Party, " Dec. 18, 1773. When the hostilities of the Revolution actually began, he was with his regiment, although he did not take an active part in the battle of Lexington. He was on his way from Salem to Boston when he learned of the death of his brother Joseph at the battle of Bunker Hill. Giving up his practice, he volunteered at once for service in the ranks. When Washington arrived in Cambridge in July 1775, the medical department of the army was organized and Warren, though only twenty-two, was appointed senior surgeon of the hospital there established. He was one of the first to enter Boston after the evacuation. In 1776 he was transferred to New York and appointed surgeon of the general hospital on Long Island. Later he saw service with the army at Trenton and also at Princeton. Returning to Boston in April 1777, he began private practice, although he also served as surgeon to the military hospital. Soon he was the leading surgeon of the city. When smallpox was prevalent, Warren, Isaac Rand, and Lemuel Hayward established, in 1778, a hospital for direct inoculation, where many patients were treated. His main interests, however, were in surgery and particularly in anatomy. Since there was no medical school at the time in Boston, he gave a private course of anatomical lectures at the military hospital in the winter of 1780-81, which were attended by men still in the army, other physicians, and a few students. There still existed popular prejudice against dissection, and the demonstrations were carried on with much privacy. The Boston Medical Society, which was organized by Warren and others in 1780, endorsed the course and asked Warren to continue his lectures each winter. A second course, given publicly, attracted many literary and scientific men, including President Willard of Harvard College. The third series of lectures and anatomical demonstrations was equally popular, and was attended by the entire senior class of Harvard College. It was soon clear, however, that a medical department in connection with the college was needed, and on September 19, 1782, Warren was requested to draw up plans for a course of instruction. When the school was established, November 22, 1782, Warren was chosen professor of anatomy and surgery. Shortly after, Benjamin Waterhouse became professor of the theory and practice of physic and Aaron Dexter, professor of chemistry and materia medica. Warren and Waterhouse were inducted into office October 7, 1783, and the first course of lectures was delivered that year. As a surgeon, Warren was a bold and skillful operator; he performed one of the first abdominal operations recorded in America and was a pioneer in amputation at the shoulder joint. His general practice also was extensive.
Achievements
Connections
He was married, November 4, 1777, to Abigail, daughter of John Collins, and was the father of seventeen children, the oldest of whom was John Collins Warren and the youngest, Edward Warren, his biographer.