Dr. Benjamin Rush: The Founding Father Who Healed a Wounded Nation
A gripping, often startling biography of the Founding Father of an America that other Founding Fathers forgot--an America of women, African Americans, Jews, Roman Catholics, Quakers, indentured workers, the poor, the mentally ill, and war veterans
Ninety percent of Americans could not vote and did not enjoy rights to life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness when our Founding Fathers proclaimed, "all men are created equal." Alone among those who signed the Declaration of Independence, Benjamin Rush heard the cries of those other, deprived Americans and stepped forth as the nation's first great humanitarian and social reformer.
Remembered primarily as America's leading, most influential physician, Rush led the Founding Fathers in calling for abolition of slavery, equal rights for women, improved medical care for injured troops, free health care for the poor, slum clearance, citywide sanitation, an end to child labor, free universal public education, humane treatment and therapy for the mentally ill, prison reform, and an end to capital punishment.
Using archival material from Edinburgh, London, Paris, and Philadelphia, as well as significant new materials from Rush's descendants and historical societies, Harlow Giles Unger's new biography restores Benjamin Rush to his rightful place in American history as the Founding Father of modern American medical care and psychiatry.
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Dr. Benjamin Rush: The Founding Father Who Healed a Wounded Nation
A gripping, often startling biography of the Founding Father of an America that other Founding Fathers forgot--an America of women, African Americans, Jews, Roman Catholics, Quakers, indentured workers, the poor, the mentally ill, and war veterans
Ninety percent of Americans could not vote and did not enjoy rights to life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness when our Founding Fathers proclaimed, "all men are created equal." Alone among those who signed the Declaration of Independence, Benjamin Rush heard the cries of those other, deprived Americans and stepped forth as the nation's first great humanitarian and social reformer.
Remembered primarily as America's leading, most influential physician, Rush led the Founding Fathers in calling for abolition of slavery, equal rights for women, improved medical care for injured troops, free health care for the poor, slum clearance, citywide sanitation, an end to child labor, free universal public education, humane treatment and therapy for the mentally ill, prison reform, and an end to capital punishment.
Using archival material from Edinburgh, London, Paris, and Philadelphia, as well as significant new materials from Rush's descendants and historical societies, Harlow Giles Unger's new biography restores Benjamin Rush to his rightful place in American history as the Founding Father of modern American medical care and psychiatry.
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Dr. Benjamin Rush: The Founding Father Who Healed a Wounded Nation

Dr. Benjamin Rush: The Founding Father Who Healed a Wounded Nation

by Harlow Giles Unger
Dr. Benjamin Rush: The Founding Father Who Healed a Wounded Nation

Dr. Benjamin Rush: The Founding Father Who Healed a Wounded Nation

by Harlow Giles Unger

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Overview

A gripping, often startling biography of the Founding Father of an America that other Founding Fathers forgot--an America of women, African Americans, Jews, Roman Catholics, Quakers, indentured workers, the poor, the mentally ill, and war veterans
Ninety percent of Americans could not vote and did not enjoy rights to life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness when our Founding Fathers proclaimed, "all men are created equal." Alone among those who signed the Declaration of Independence, Benjamin Rush heard the cries of those other, deprived Americans and stepped forth as the nation's first great humanitarian and social reformer.
Remembered primarily as America's leading, most influential physician, Rush led the Founding Fathers in calling for abolition of slavery, equal rights for women, improved medical care for injured troops, free health care for the poor, slum clearance, citywide sanitation, an end to child labor, free universal public education, humane treatment and therapy for the mentally ill, prison reform, and an end to capital punishment.
Using archival material from Edinburgh, London, Paris, and Philadelphia, as well as significant new materials from Rush's descendants and historical societies, Harlow Giles Unger's new biography restores Benjamin Rush to his rightful place in American history as the Founding Father of modern American medical care and psychiatry.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780306824333
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Publication date: 04/08/2025
Sold by: OPEN ROAD INTEGRATED - EBKS
Format: eBook
Pages: 282
File size: 36 MB
Note: This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

Acclaimed historian Harlow Giles Unger is a former Distinguished Visiting Fellow at George Washington's Mount Vernon. He is the author of twenty-six previous books, including twelve biographies of America's Founding Fathers and three histories of the early Republic. He lives in New York City.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations xi

Acknowledgments xiii

Chronology xv

Prologue 1

Chapter 1 The Making of a Physician 5

Chapter 2 The Making of a Patriot 29

Chapter 3 Broken by a Cannon Ball 55

Chapter 4 "The Revolution Is Not Over!" 75

Chapter 5 My Friends in Jails 99

Chapter 6 Murder by War 121

Chapter 7 The Hundred Days of Doom 139

Chapter 8 "You Cannot Die Now, Doctor!" 151

Chapter 9 Bleed, Bleed, Bleed 165

Chapter 10 Father of Psychiatry 181

Chapter 11 On the Causes of Death 201

Chapter 12 Healing the Last Wound 227

Post Mortem 247

Appendix A Selected Writings of Benjamin Rush by Topic 251

Appendix B Medical Inquiries and Observations by Benjamin Rush 259

Appendix C Essays: Literary, Moral & Philosophical 263

Appendix D Thomas Jefferson's Syllabus of an Estimate of the Merit of the Doctrines of Jesus, Compared with Those of Others 265

Notes 269

Selected Bibliography 287

Index 293

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