G. W. Pickerill, M. D. |
GEORGE
WASHINGTON PICKERILL, M. D. In all the elements
of higher manhood George Washington Pickerill, M. D.,
is the peer of the best of his race and his life is one that
merits a lengthened record, that it may prove an example for
the emulation of others. He was born at Cicero,
Hamilton County, Ohio, August 31, 1837, his father and
mother, Samuel J. and Mahala M. Pickerill, having
immigrated from Brown County, Ohio, in 1832 to this point,
while it was yet a wilderness. The father was among
the first of the dauntless spirits to engage in platting and
organizing the now thriving town of Cicero, and after seing
it grow into a prosperous village, removed with his family
to Clinton County, Ind., where the pioneer life was lived
over with all its perils and dangers. The wild and
savage beasts of the woods made the air resound with their
cries and the wilder savage red man threatened with tomahawk
and knife. Amid such scenes the early days of
George were passed and his education was limited to the
subscription school of three months in the year. In 1848 the
father took his family to La Fayette, Ind., and George, at
the age of eleven, went in his father's store, but his
ambitious mind would not forego the benefit of the school,
which was taught in the winter. At the age of
seventeen the intelligent lad entered the Northwestern
Christian University, now Butler, fired with the
determination to be a minister, an idea implanted by his
father's ardent desire and the urgent pleadings of the
preachers who visited his father's house, which was
''preacher's home" in all that territory. At the end
of three years his heart's desire was gratified and he
entered upon the preacher's life with the enthusiasm of a
young Paul. He was fluent in speech, earnest,
devout and eloquent. For two years he labored
earnestly and spoke with persuasive force, and then grave
doubts filled his breast. He was not lacking in love
for the work, nor was his zeal abated; still a voice within
bade him halt and "take his hand from the plow."
Introspection revealed the fact that his mind was
speculative, combative, scientific and progressive— traits
which were taking complete control of him and which he could
not possibly resist, and which would bring him into conflict
with the conservative spirit of the church. The ideal
preacher of his youth and college days was in absolute
antagonism with the actual preacher he was becoming, and the
disappointment was terrible. For the sake of peace in
the church and to follow the lead of his own conscience he
withdrew from the ministry. Rejecting the law from a
mistaken under standing of its scope he turned to the study
of medicine, he having long been a student of books on
physical life. Reverses in his father's business threw
him upon his own resources at the age of twenty. Still
undismayed, he taught school and studied medicine in the
meantime. For five years he taught, his first school
being at his old home, La Fayette, and his second at Paxton,
Ill., and at the latter place one of his pupils, a
black-eyed little miss, Melvina E. Hall, captured his
heart. His love was returned, but they waited for
twenty-five long years before the day of consummation of
their happiness; she waiting in sublime faith and devotion,
while he struggled to acquire a competency. But the longest
road has its turning, and the long waited for day finally
arrived, the 17th day of May, 1887, the dawn of a bliss as
perfect as it is possible for mortals to attain unto.
The happy couple in their married life seemed to be repaid
for all their years of delay and disappointment. Alas,
this bright and happy period had a sad and terrible
termination, for in a little less than one year this brave
wife and beloved woman died, a sacrifice upon the sacred
altar of maternal love. Of this sad and terrible
bereavement the following touching account was handed us by
a friend, it having appeared in the doctor's paper, the
Medical Free Press: "IN MEMORY.
"The
angel of death came and claimed our wife and infant child. A
wife little less than one short year. A sacrifice on
the sacred altar of maternal love: an incense as pure and
holy as the angel ever wafted from the shrine of connubial
fidelity and affection. She is gone and we are left
alone—utterly, sadly alone, hut with the assurance
"Here, down here 'tis dust
to dust:
There, up there 'tis heart to heart."
Tears may speak,
but the heart and pen are crushed. Hence we present an
editorial from the Paxton (Ill.) Record, Mr. N. E.
Stevens, editor:
"GONE TO HER REST."
Died, in this city, on Saturday, April 2, at
the home of her parents, Mr. and Mrs. J. D. Hall, Mrs.
Melvina E. Pickerill wife of Dr. George W. Pickerill,
of Indianapolis, Ind. The deceased was one of the best
known and most highly esteemed of Paxton's daughters,
having resided in this city and vicinity since her childhood
days, until a year since, when she married and removed to
Indianapolis, her death occurring while on a visit to her
friends in this city. Mrs. P. was a Christian
in the highest sense of the term. Her life in Paxton
was noted for the good work she accomplished in society, the
church and Sabbath-school. In Indianapolis, though a
comparative stranger, she won the esteem of the Christian
people in and out of her own church by her untiring labors.
The marriage of this couple was something of the romantic.
Twenty-six years ago, Dr. Pickerill, then a
penniless young man, taught school in the Strayer district,
in what is now Button township, and Miss Hall
was his pupil. The acquaintance ripened into love and
they became engaged. The would-be benedict started out
in the world to make the fortune which should make it
possible for them to marry. Adopting medicine as a
profession he struggled for an education, and graduated both
from Ann Arbor, Mich., and the Eclectic Medical Institute,
of Cincinnati, and twenty years ago settled down to practice
in Indianapolis. Years of time were required to
acquire a practice and accumulate means, and during the long
delay correspondence had ceased and they had heard nothing
from each other, yet the old love remained and neither
married. In the mean time the doctor had taken high
rank in his profession, being at that time a professor of
physiology in the Indiana Eclectic Medical College, and
editor of the Indiana Eclectic Medical Journal now
Medical Free Press. Two years ago they met
at Indianapolis, after twenty-four year's separation.
The old love remained undiminished, and a year later they
were married in that city. The eleven months which
have expired since have been full of happiness for them, and
though the end is abrupt and sad beyond description to the
bereaved husband, he has the consolation not only of earthly
friends but in the assurance that she has but gone before to
a better world where he will surely follow. We had the
pleasure of the acquaintance of Dr. Pickerill
while he was in the city, and found him a genial and
intelligent gentleman of broad information and much enjoyed
our interview with him."
In the year 1884
Dr. Pickerill became editor and publisher of the
Indiana Eclectic Medical Journal, then in its second year.
In 1890 he changed its name to Medical Free Press,
and this he still owns and edits, putting in most of his
time in this, a labor of love. Because of broken
health, caused by overwork and exposure in the practice of
his profession, he confines his practice to his office.
For the same reason he has resigned his connection with the
college. The terrible bereavement through which he has
just passed has cast a gloom over his life, from which he
will probably never emerge. The love for the estimable
woman for whom he had labored more than three times as long
as did Jacob for Rachel had intensified with
the years, and he had counted upon a long period of wedded
happiness so that the shock of the loss was and is yet
unbearable. Still, with the weight of this sorrow that
will not be comforted, and with the burden of ill health, he
works along stoically and with a sense of duty, giving a
large share of his time to study, reading and reflection,
these qualities and virtues having clung to him tenaciously
through all the vicissitudes of his career. He does
not care much for light literature, but religious,
scientific and philosophical subjects are absorbing passions
with him, and he pursues them with all the ardor that
characterized him in the olden days when he was passing
through the struggle of remaining in the ministry or giving
it up for something else. Those who know the Doctor
well realize that his nature is profoundly sympathetic, like
as the pity of a father for his children, he being keenly
alive to the joys and the sorrows of others. He is a
warm generous friend, yet his is the faculty that can love
intensely without hating; for no matter how much one may
have injured him he does not and cannot bear malice, or seek
revenge against the offender. He is naturally of a
most lively temper; indeed it is somewhat cyclonic, at
times, in its intensity, and like the cyclone its force is
soon spent. It is not possible that a nature as
intense as his could escape such ebullitions. But to
his infinite credit be it said, he overcomes himself, and
therein is mightier than he who overcometh a city. In
the language of the Book, he gets angry but sins not.
When the storm provoked by the iniquity of some one has
stirred the depths of his being, it rapidly dissipates
without having done any hurt, for at such a time he keeps
within the compass of his own dominion, and with the
dissipating of the clouds an infinite calm succeeds and a
humility succeeds and a full and free pardon of the offender
is granted, whether forgiveness be asked or not. Thus
his life has passed, chiefly solitary, except in the one
short year of his married life, yet it has been a life of
usefulness, largely devoted to the healing of the afflicted
and the using of his whole influence in making people
brighter and better. In the hours of his weightiest
sorrow, even, he must find a measure of solace at least, in
the reflection that his life has been unselfish and that it
has been privileged him to do much good to his fellow
mortals in his journey along the road of life. Early
in life or about the age of fifteen years he united with the
Christian Church and it is now the happy thought of his life
that he has lived a devoted adherent to his faith.
Source: Pictorial and Biographical Memoirs - Indianapolis
and Marion County, Indiana - Publ. Chicago - Goodspeed
Brothers, Publishers - 1893 - Page 26 |
