supplying the service with unadulterated drugs. He was again fleet surgeon of the East India squadron in 1847-'50, of the Pacific squadron in 1854-'7, and of the Mediterranean squadron from August, 1860, till July, 1861. During the intervals between cruises he was on duty at Philadelphia. During the civil war he was surgeon of the Boston navy-yard. He was on special duty at Philadelphia in 1865-'70, was the senior officer in the medical corps in 1866-'9, and was retired on 4 Sept., 1869. He was president of the Academy of natural sciences of Philadelphia in 1870-'82, and president of the College of physicians of Philadelphia in 1879-'83. He was commissioned medical director on the retired list, 3 March, 1871. Dr. Ruschenberger had published some of the results of his investigations during his cruises, by which he had acquired a wide reputation. Among his works are “Three Years in the Pacific” (Philadelphia, 1834; 2 vols., London, 1835); “A Voyage around the World, 1835-7” (Philadelphia, 1838; omitting strictures on the British government, 2 vols., London. 1838); “Elements of Natural History” (2 vols., Philadelphia, 1850); “A Lexicon of Terms used in Natural History” (1850); “A Notice of the Origin, Progress, and Present Condition of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia” (1852); and “Notes and Commentaries during Voyages to Brazil and China, 1848” (Richmond, 1854). He had also published numerous articles on naval rank and organization (1845-'50), and contributed papers to medical and scientific journals, and he edited the American edition of Mrs. Somerville's “Physical Geography,” with additions and a glossary (1850; new ed., 1853).
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RUSH, Benjamin, signer of the Declaration of Independence, b. in Byberry township, Pa., 24 Dec., 1745; d. in Philadelphia, 19 April, 1813. His ancestor, John, who was a captain of horse in Cromwell's army, emigrated to this country in 1683, and left a large number of descendants. Benjamin's father died when the son was six years old. His earliest instructor was his uncle, Rev. Samuel Finley, subsequently president of Princeton, who prepared him for that college. He was graduated in 1760, and subsequently in the medical department of the University of Edinburgh in 1768, after studying under Dr. John Redman, of Philadelphia. He also attended medical lectures in England and in Paris, where he enjoyed the friendship of Benjamin Franklin, who advanced the means of paying his expenses. In August, 1769, he returned to the United States and settled in Philadelphia, where he was elected professor of chemistry in the City medical college. In 1771 he published essays on slavery, temperance, and health, and in 1774 he delivered the annual oration before the Philosophical society on the “Natural History of Medicine among the Indians of North America.” He early engaged in pre-Revolutionary movements, and wrote constantly for the press on colonial rights. He was a member of the provincial conference of Pennsylvania, and chairman of the committee that reported that it had become expedient for congress to declare independence, and surgeon to the Pennsylvania navy from 17 Sept., 1775, to 1 July, 1776. He was then elected to the latter body, and on 4 July, 1776, signed the declaration. He married Julia, a daughter of Richard Stockton, the same year, was appointed surgri in-general of the middle department in April. 1777, and in July became physician-general. Although in constant attendance on the wounded in the battles of Trenton, Princeton, the Brandywine, Germantown, and in the sickness at Valley Forge, he found time to write tour long public letters to the people of Pennsylvania, in which he commented severely on the articles of confederation of 1776, and urged a revision on the ground of the dangers of giving legislative powers to a single house. In February, 1778, he resigned his military office on account of wrongs that had been done to the soldiers in regard to the hospital stores, and a coldness between himself and Gen. Washington, but, though he was without means at that time, he refused all compensation for his service in the army. He then returned to Philadelphia, resumed his practice and duties as professor, and for twenty-nine years was surgeon to the Pennsylvania hospital, and port physician to Philadelphia in 1790-'3. He was a founder of Dickinson college and the Philadelphia dispensary, and was largely interested in the establishment of public schools, concerning which he published an address, and in the founding of the College of physicians, of which he was one of the first censors. He was a member of the State convention that ratified the constitution of the United States in 1787, and of that for forming a state constitution in the same year, in which he endeavored to procure the incorporation of his views on public schools, and a penal code on which he had previously written essays. After that service he retired from political life. While in occupation of the chair of chemistry in Philadelphia medical college, he was elected to that of the theory and practice of medicine, to which was added the professorship of the institutes and practice of medicine and clinical practice in 1791, and that of the practice of physic in 1797, all of which he held until his death. During the epidemic of yellow fever in 1793 he rendered good service, visiting from 100 to 120 patients daily, but his bold and original practice made him enemies, and a paper edited by William Cobbett, called “Peter Porcupine's Gazette,” was so violent in its attacks upon him that it was prosecuted, and a jury rendered a verdict of $5,000 damages, which Dr. Rush distributed among the poor. His practice during the epidemic convinced him that yellow fever is not contagious, and he was the first to proclaim that the disease is indigenous. From 1799 till his death he was treasurer of the U. S. mint. “His name,” says Dr. Thomas Young, “was familiar to the medical world as the Sydenham of America. His accurate observations and correct discrimination of epidemic diseases well entitled him to this distinction, while in the original energy of his reasoning he far exceeded his prototype.” He was a member of nearly every medical, literary, and benevolent institution in this country, and of many foreign societies, and for his replies to their queries on the subject of yellow fever received a medal from the king of Prussia in 1805, and gifts from other crowned heads. He succeeded Benjamin Franklin as president of the Pennsylvania society for the abolition of slavery, was president
