inhalers resumed their vocation. Immediately an unwonted hilarity seized
the party—they became brightened, very happy, and very loquacious—
expatiating on the delicious aromas of the new fluid ... but suddenly there
was talk of sounds being heard like those of a cotton mill louder and
louder; a moment more and then all was quiet—and the crash!”^23
All who had inhaled the chloroform vapors completely lost
consciousness, awakening some time later with everyone on the floor,
contorted in the positions in which they had collapsed. The entire supply
of chloroform was duly exhausted that night, but not before Simpson’s
niece took her turn, and after drawing in the chloroform vapors,
exclaimed, “I’m an angel! Oh, I’m an angel!”
What sounds like a modern drug party was a quasi-scientific
investigation into a better anesthetic, and Simpson’s exploration led to his
use of chloroform in obstetrics and eventually, to its being the preferred
surgical anesthetic in Europe for decades to come.
John Snow is both the world’s first epidemiologist (for his work on
cholera) and the world’s first full-time anesthesiologist. He was adept at
using a glass inhaler for the administration of ether anesthesia, and
eschewing the relatively dangerous technique of simple chloroform-
soaked handkerchief administration, developed an inhaler for the safer
administration of Simpson’s drug. Unlike the American ether pioneers,
Simpson and Snow would both be heralded as heroic innovators, leading
fruitful careers, with Snow providing chloroform anesthesia for Queen
Victoria’s deliveries in 1853 and 1857.^24
By the 1860s, there was widespread use of chloroform and ether across
America and Europe. We have an inaccurate view of anesthesia during the
American Civil War—many of us picture gruesome amputation scenes
like that in Gone with the Wind, where men are begging for mercy,
screaming, “Leave me alone ... I can’t stand it! Don’t cut, don’t cut, don’t
... please!” In actuality, chloroform was used by both sides during the
Civil War, although supplies of the anesthetic would have been
unpredictable at times.
An interesting twist of fate during the Civil War was that William
Morton provided anesthesia for the Union troops and Crawford Long
served as an anesthetist for Confederate troops. Even in war, these two
antagonists were on opposite sides. It was not the first (nor the last) time