Witness to History: Anderson R. Abbott, Civil War Surgeon

Circulating Now welcomes historian Jill L. Newmark to share the story of Dr. Anderson R. Abbott and her research in the National Library of Medicine’s Anderson Ruffin Abbott Papers.

On a winter evening in February 1864, two U.S. Army officers appeared at the White House in their dress uniforms to attend a reception.  The warm welcome they received from President Abraham Lincoln would not have been unusual for a White House guest, but the protests from Lincoln’s son Robert about receiving these two visitors and allowing “this innovation” made it apparent that this was not a usual occurrence.  That evening, two Black army officers, First Lieutenant Anderson R. Abbott and Major Alexander T. Augusta, made history by attending a levee at the White House.

In 2010, the National Library of Medicine’s History of Medicine Division acquired the papers of Anderson Ruffin Abbott as a donation from his great-granddaughter, Catherine Slaney.  The collection includes documents and writings by Abbott that illuminate his education, his experience as a military surgeon, and his thoughts on politics, science, and philosophy.  Abbott was one of fourteen Black men who served as a surgeon with the Union Army during the American Civil War.  As part of this elite group of physicians, he tended to the medical needs of Black soldiers of the United States Colored Troops and Black civilians in Washington, D.C.  The materials in the Anderson Ruffin Abbott Papers include lecture tickets from medical school, personal writings on astronomy and history, and biographical vignettes.

Born in Ontario, Canada in 1837, Abbott grew up in a family dedicated to advancement, education, and service.  His parents were born in the United States, but after marrying, they immigrated from Alabama to Canada to escape the harsh treatment, discrimination, and threats against their family and their business on account of color.  Slavery had been abolished in Canada in 1834 with no legal means for white enslavers to repossess a formerly enslaved person once that individual crossed into Canada.  It became a safe haven for those escaping enslavement and the harsh prejudice and violence in America.

Establishing their family in Toronto, the Abbotts became involved in social and religious activities.  They became a well-established family acquiring real estate and supporting their community through their service.  Their wealth enabled them to provide an education for their children including attendance at the Buxton Mission School in the Elgin Settlement in Buxton, Ontario.  Established by a white Presbyterian minister, the settlement offered social and economic opportunities for Black people especially the formerly enslaved who crossed the border into Canada from the United States.

The Buxton Mission School provided a progressive education to its students, and it became one of the first racially integrated schools in North America. Among its early students was Anderson R. Abbott who excelled at academics and developed an interest in pursuing a career in medicine.  After completing his education at the Buxton Mission School, he continued his formal education at Oberlin College in Ohio in 1856, a school with a reputation for abolitionist activities.  Abbott would finally pursue his medical education in earnest two years later at the University of Toronto’s School of Medicine.  He became the first Black Canadian-born licentiate of the Medical Board of Upper Canada giving him the credentials to practice medicine.

With the outbreak of the American Civil War in 1861, many Black Canadians and American expatriates kept a careful eye on the progress of the war and expressed an interest in participating in the fight for freedom in the United States.  In 1863, when a local Toronto newspaper reported that the United States would begin the recruitment of Black men, Abbott followed in the footsteps of his mentor Alexander T. Augusta, the first black man to be commissioned as a medical officer in the U.S. Army, and he applied for a position as surgeon with the newly formed colored troops.  His desire to participate was not deterred by geographic boundaries or birthplace.  He said:

“I am a Canadian first and last and all the time, but that did not deter me from sympathizing with a nation struggling to wipe out a great iniquity.”

In June, he was offered a contract position as an acting assistant surgeon and assigned to Contraband Hospital in Washington, D.C. to serve under the direction of his friend and mentor Major Augusta. After his arrival in Washington, he became acquainted with Elizabeth Keckly, seamstress and confidante to First Lady Mary Lincoln, who lived in the same boarding house as Abbott.  Their friendship would become an important part of Abbott’s life in Washington.  The positions that Abbott and Augusta held as military surgeons provided entrée into social and political circles previously unavailable to Black people and with the help of Keckly brought them to the White House to mingle with the elite of the city.

On a cold evening in February 1864, Abbott and Augusta made their way to the White House to attend a reception.  In their full-dress uniforms, they entered the White House porch that evening, and as Abbott recalled in his later years, the Executive Mansion was a “blaze of light with carriages containing handsomely dressed ladies, citizens and soldiers.”  After being met at the door, they were escorted to the reception line and were warmly welcomed by the president.

As they walked into the East Room of the White House, they were the focus of everyone’s attention.  Abbott recalled, “We could not have been more surprised ourselves or created more surprise if we had been dropped down upon them through a sky-light.”  It was clear to Abbott that their presence at the White House was controversial and garnered mixed reactions from those in attendance.

 “Wherever we went a space was cleared for us and we became the center of a new circle of interest.  Some stared at us merely from curiosity, others with an expression of friendly interest.  While others again scowled at us in such a significant way that left no doubt as to what views they held on the Negro question.”

After the war ended in 1865, Abbott remained in Washington, D.C. continuing his work at Contraband Hospital now Freedman’s Hospital until his contract expired in 1866.  He returned to Canada and went on to earn his Bachelor in Medicine from the University of Toronto in 1867 and became a registered member of the College of Physicians and Surgeons in 1869.  He married and started a family and continued his work as a physician and activist.

Abbott became the first Black coroner of Kent County in 1874, and by 1881, he retired from his position as coroner and re-established a medical practice.  He would eventually move to Chicago and serve as superintendent of Provident Hospital and Training School, the first black owned and operated hospital in the United States after the departure of its founder Dr. Daniel Hale Williams in 1894.

Abbott returned to Canada several years later and continued to lecture and write, and would begin writing a memoir, recalling his experiences in the Civil War and his opinions of life, work and history.  On December 13, 1913, Abbott died as a result of complications from an appendectomy.

Throughout Abbott’s life he revealed himself to be a man of deep convictions with a strong moral compass, a sense of humanity, and a dedication to equality, knowledge, freedom, and patriotism.

Jill L. Newmark is an independent historian and former curator and exhibition specialist at the National Library of Medicine.  She curated several exhibitions for NLM including Binding Wounds, Pushing Boundaries:  African Americans in Civil War Medicine.  Her recent book, Without Concealment, Without Compromise: The Courageous Lives of Black Civil War Surgeons explores the lives and service of fourteen Black physicians who served as surgeons during the American Civil War.