Usher Parsons papers

Usher Parsons (1788-1868) was born and raised in Alfred, Maine, the son of William and Abigail Parsons . After studying under physicians in ·Maine and in Boston, he secured a commission as naval surgeon's mate at the outset of the war of 1812. He was later assigned to a small fleet under the command of Oliver Hazard Perry, and his performance as the only surgeon at the Battle of Lake Erie on September 10, 1813, has become legendary in the annals of military surgery. He remained under Perry's command after the conclusion of the war on the frigate USS JAVA, which sailed to Algiers and other Mediterranean ports, returning in March of 1817. He then obtained a medical degree at Harvard and returned to naval service on the frigate GUERRIERE through 1820.

In 1822, Parsons settled permanently in Providence, RI. He soon married Mary Jackson Holmes (1802-1825), the sister of famed poet Oliver Wendell Holmes. They had one child, Charles W. Parsons (1823-1893). Usher Parsons was a professor of anatomy and surgery at Brown University from 1823 to 1828; president of the Rhode Island Medical Society from1837 to 1839, served briefly as acting president of the American Medical Association in 1853, and was the first president of the Rhode Island Natural History Society in 1837. He was also active in the early years of the Rhode Island Historical Society, and was the author of "A Brief Account of the Early Physicians and of the Medical Society of Rhode Island" (American Quarterly Register, February 1840) as well as numerous other medical and historical articles and addresses.

- Taken from the original finding aid from the Rhode Island Historical Society.