In 1812, being appointed surgeon in the Western Army, under General Simon Perkins, he served in the regiment of Colonel Hays in the campaign on the Maumee River. In passing through Cleveland, General Perkins desired to secure for Dr. Allen a case of instruments belonging to the United States Government. Finding it impossible by any requisition to secure these, he sent a squad of soldiers and seizing them delivered them to Dr. Allen to be used in the campaign.
A necessary result of Dr. Allen's pioneer position was of course the endurance of many hardships, on account of his extended practice. There were no roads and the paths were often marked only by blazed trees. Sometimes at night he was piloted through the forest by torches made of hickory bark.
His son, who was born in 1814, remembers to have heard him prophesy that the time would come when there would be no grass or stumps in the roads between the wagon tracks.
Dr. Allen in his practice covered twelve townships in Northeastern Ohio and Western Pennsylvania, and he was called largely in consultation and for operation over a much wider territory. Among the operations which he performed without an anesthetic were ligation of the femoral artery for aneurysm, tracheotomy, amputations of leg, thigh, arm and shoulder-joint, together with operations for strangulated hernia and the removal of tumors. The casualties incident to pioneer life requiring his attention were numerous. Dr. Allen kept well up to date, and the position as student under him was much sought, and he had usually three or four with him. It was his custom to assign to them regular reading, and to spend a portion of every evening in questioning them upon what they had studied.
He was a censor in the medical college at Willoughby, which was the first medical college in Northern Ohio, and later in the Cleveland Medical College, which was its successor.
In 1835 he was elected first president of the Ohio Medical Convention, which was the parent society of the Ohio State Medical Society. He was elected president of the latter society in 1856.
In his address, delivered at that time, he speaks of having made a journey to Columbus in the latter part of 1826, for the purpose of organizing a state medical society. The journey was made on horseback and required a week in going, another in returning, and a third in Columbus, the journey being made over roads which were well nigh impassable except for a man on horseback.
In 1840 he was elected a member of the state legislature, but absolutely refused further political honors.
Dr. Erastus Cushing characterizes him as one of the most prominent medical men in the Western Reserve, and Dr. Delamater wrote, "I would rather have Dr. Allen's influence with the Cleveland Medical College than any physician in Northern Ohio."
May 13, 1813, Dr. Allen married Charity Dudley, who was born in Bethlehem, Connecticut. She died in 1840. Their only child was Dudley Allen, who succeeded his father in his practice.
Dr. Peter Allen died in Kinsman, Ohio, September 1, 1864, of cholera morbus.
His writings were confined to addresses and papers read before the various medical societies of the state.
Allen, Timothy Field (1837–1902)
Timothy Field Allen, botanist, was born in Westminster, Vermont, April 24, 1837, and died at his home in New York City, December 5, 1902. He graduated A. B. at Amherst College in 1858, and subsequently received the degree of A. M. from the same institution. He graduated M. D. in 1861 at the University of the City of New York and in the same year commenced practice at Brooklyn, N. Y. In 1862 he was an acting assistant surgeon in the United States Army, and in the following year established himself in New York City, which remained the field of his labors for nearly forty years. Becoming associated professionally with Dr. Carroll Dunham, he early adopted homeopathy, and soon rose to a prominent position among homeopathic practitioners.
In 1865 he received the degree of M.D. from the Homeopathic (Hahnemann) Medical College, of Philadelphia; two years later he became professor of materia medica in the New York Homeopathic College, and from 1882 was its dean. For many years he was surgeon to the New York Ophthalmic Hospital, and was largely instrumental in the establishment of the Laura Franklin Free Hospital for Children and the Flower Hospital, in New York City. He was one of the editors of the New York Journal of Homeopathy, 1873–75, and later edited an "Encyclopedia of Pure Materia Medica" in ten volumes, 1875–79; he was also the author of "A Handbook of Ma-
