Dr. Robert Hanham Collyer

The Strange Life of a Mesmerist, Phrenologist and Ether Controversy

Jump-Up-Behinder

A.J. Wright, M.L.S.

David Chestnut, M.D., Section on the History of AnesthesiaDepartment of Anesthesiology

UASOMBirmingham, Alabama

Lancet’s Opinion, 1847

• “Dr. Collyer should produce something like proof of his liberality…As yet, nothing of this kind has been supplied, and until it is (he) must be content to belong to the class of jump-up-behinders.” –Thomas Wakley, editor, 1: 163, Feb. 6, 1847

Robert Hanham Collyer [1814-1891?]

• Born 5 March 1814

• St. Helier, Jersey, Channel Islands, U.K.

• Father: Robert Mitchell Collyer[1787-1859]

• Mother: Ann Elizabeth Dugarden[abt. 1798-after 1864]

Channel Islands

St. Helier Today

Robert Hanham Collyer [1814-1891?]

• Graduated from Berkshire MC [Mass., 1823-1869] in 1839

• Died, New Orleans, Louisiana, 1891?• Sisters Sarah and Anne, living in Mobile,

Alabama, at the time, made a statutory declaration 4 September 1897 that brother Robert had died in N.O. six years earlier

• No grave, death certificate, newspaper account or other evidence of RHC’s death has yet been found

Collyer in the Literature

• “The History of Anaesthetic Discovery II.” Lancet 1:840-844, 1870 [Probably by B.W. Richardson]

• Sykes, “The Jump-Up-Behinder” in Essays volume 3, 1982, pp 45-60

• Stoehr, “Robert H. Collyer’s Technology of the Soul” in Pseudo-Science and Society in Nineteenth Century America, 1987, pp 21-45

• Gibson, Pain and Its Conquest 1982 pp 38-40

Collyer in the Literature II

• Nygren, “Rubens Peale’s Experiments with Mesmerism.” Proc Am Philosoph Soc 114(2): 100-108, 1970

• Schmit, “Re-Visioning Antebellum American Psychology: The Dissemination of Mesmerism, 1836-1854” History of Psychology 8:403-434, 2005

• Hildebrandt, “’This My Likeness’: The Facts in the Case of the Notorious Dr. R.H. Collyer” in Daguerreian Annual 2007

RHC’s Publications I

• Manual of Phrenology, or, the Physiology of the Human Brain [1838, 158pp.; 4th ed., 1839]

• Lights and Shadows of American Life [1843, 40pp.]

• History and Philosophy of Animal Magnetism…by a Practical Magnetizer [1843, 32pp.]

RHC’s Publications II

• Psychography, or, the Embodiment of Thought; with an Analysis of Phrenomagnetism…[1843, 44pp.]

• The fossil human jaw from Suffolk. Anthropological Review 5:221-229, 1867

RHC’s Publications III

• History of the Anaesthetic Discovery by the Discoverer [1868, 68pp.]

• Mysteries of the Vital Element in Connextion with Dreams, Somnambulism, Trance, Vital Photography, Faith and Will, Anaesthesia, Nervous Congestion and Creative Function. Modern Spiritualism Explained. [1871, 144pp.]

RHC’s Publications IV

• Review of the Lancet’s Article on the History of Anaesthetic Discovery by the Original Discoverer [1871, 15pp.]

RHC’s Publications V

• Exalted States of the Nervous System in Explanation of the Mysteries of Modern Spiritualism, Dreams, Trance, Somnambulism, Vital Photography, Faith, Will, Origin of Life, Anaesthesia, and Nervous Congestion. [1873, 3rd ed., 144pp.]

RHC’s Publications VI

• Automatic Writing. The Slade Prosecution. Vindication of the Truth. [1876, 23pp.]

RHC’s Publications VII

• Early History of the Anaesthetic Discovery; or Painless Surgical Operations. With Letters to and from Sir James Y. Simpson, Dr. Benjamin W. Richardson and Dr. Henry Bennet. Boston versus Hartford. [1877, 72pp.]

Lithograph of Young RHC [?]

• Frontispiece in Lights and Shadows [1843]

• RHC claimed in letter to Boston newspaper he didn’t write that book

• Source: G. Culshaw via Am. Antiquarian Soc.

RHC’s Sciences

• Phrenomagnetism—which detected brain “organs” missed by orthodox phrenology: Sarcasm, Love of Pets, Desire for Seeing Ancient Places and so forth

• Psychography—transferring mental images by bouncing them off a bowl of molasses

RHC’s early studies

• Spurzheim in Paris, pre-1833

• Elliotson at London University, 1833-1835

• RHC claimed he was rendered unconcious by ether inhalation while at London University

Johann Gaspar Spurzheim

• 1776-1832• German physician• One of chief

proponents of phrenology

• Died in Boston• Studied under F.J.

Gall, founder of phrenology [ca. 1800]

John Elliotson

• 1791-1868• British physician,

proponent of mesmerism

• Surgical Operations in the Mesmeric State without Pain [1843]

• In 1849 founded a mesmeric hospital

RHC in America I

• Arrived in Philadelphia 21 March 1836 with parents and siblings aboard the Kensington

• Between 1838 and 1843, lectured on mesmerism and phrenology in eastern U.S. and Canada

• Cities included NY, Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington and New Orleans

• Renowned for 3-month, 75-lecture series in Boston in 1841

RHC in America II

• “…mesmerizers are found by scores, mesmerisees by the hundreds, and converts by tens of thousands.” [“Public Exhibitions” by RHC, Mesmeric Magazine 1(1): 14-15, 1842]

• “I rate Collyer as one of the four most important of the American mesmerists (even though he was an émigré).” –David Schmit [Personal communication 4/2009]

American Museum, NYC

P.T. Barnum

• He took over operation of the American Museum in December 1841

• Nitrous oxide demonstrations took place for a brief period in 1842 [?]

RHC, Poe and Hawthorne

• RHC met Poe in spring 1843

• RHC praised “The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar,” Poe’s famous hoax account of suspended animation via mesmerism

• Hawthorne mentions RHC in “The Hall of Fantasy,” Pioneer 1:55, 1845

Hawthorne and Poe

RHC’s Letter to Poe I

• “Dear Sir—your account of M. Valdemar’s case has…created a very great sensation. It requires from me no apology, in stating, that I have not the least doubt of the possibility of such a phenomenon; for I did actually restore to active animation a person who died from excessive drinking of ardent spirits.”

RHC’s Letter to Poe II

• “My dear sir, I have battled the storm of public derision too long on the subject of Mesmerism, to be now found in the rear ranks—though I have not publicly lectured for more than two years, I have steadily made it a subject of deep investigation.” --Boston, 16 December 1845

RHC 1843-1848

• Returned to England in 1843

• Married Susannah Macdonald in April, 1845

• Returned to NY, July, 1845

• Worked in cholera hospital, Mexico, 1845

• Back to England, back to NY, 1846-48

RHC 1848

• Appears in New Orleans with his troupe of “Model Artistes”; Walt Whitman in audience

• Troupe appeared in Mobile in April, 1848, just after a series of appearance by G.Q. Colton

• RHC’s troupe reproduced on stage paintings and sculptures by famous artists

RHC’s Inventions I

• New method of crushing quartz [1851]

• New amalgamating apparatus [1852]

• Improved breech-loading cannon [1854]

• Quartz pulverizer patented [1854]

• Gold-Amalgamator patented [1854]

• New coating for hulls of iron ships [1859]

RHC’s Inventions II

• New paper material [1860]

• New machine for cleaning wheat [1862]

• Chemical ink pencil [1862]

• Covering for electric telegraph cables [1862]

• New chemical tubing [1863]

• New machinery for treating flax [1870]

RHC’s Anesthesia Claims I

• 1839 Dec.: Reduction of hip-joint; anesthetic state induced by inhalation of alcoholic fumes

• 1841 Dec.: Removal of globe of eye in 22-month old child; anesthetic state induced by mesmerism

RHC’s Anesthesia Claims II

• 1843 April: Tooth extraction with anesthetic state induced by inhalation of narcotic and stimulating vapors

• 1843 May: Publication of “Psychography” in which RHC states on 7 different pages that unconsciousness can be induced by inhalation of narcotic or stimulating vapors

Sykes Opinion, 1982

• “The obscure subjects about which he wrote were, and still are, well worth investigating…He resembled Charles T. Jackson in his anxiety to claim credit for a discovery made by others. Jackson died insane—I wonder if the same thing happened to Collyer?” [p. 52]

Lancet’s Claim, 1870

• “It is difficult to estimate what effect Dr. Collyer’s lectures and writings had upon the direct progress of discovery;, but…they excited great general attention…” [p.842]

• “…it is one of the strangest of coincidences…that the development of the anaesthetic process by inhalation took place immediately after Collyer’s public exhibitions, and in the very centres where his lectures had been delivered.” [p.842]

Mr. Geoffrey Culshaw

• With a Collyer family pedigree book

• His daughter, Helen Mitchell, has worked on the detailed chronology of RHC’s life

Photo Sources I

• *Poe• http://www.bc.edu/schools/cas/english/poe-events.html

• *Hawthorne• http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Nathaniel_Hawth

orne_old.jpg

• *American Museum• http://history1800s.about.com/od/americanoriginals/ig/Ima

ges-of-Phineas-T--Barnum/American-Museum-Building.htm

Photo Sources II

• *Barnum• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:L_barnum_m253.jpg

• *Spurzheim• http://www.usyd.edu.au/museums/images/content/exhibiti

ons/ePhren_Gall.jpg

• *Elliotson• http://www.general-anaesthesia.com/images/john-

elliotson.html

Map Sources

• *Channel Islands Map

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Channel_islands_location.png

• *St. Helier today

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Saint_Helier_from_Noirmont_Jersey.jpg