In many an old garret, or treasured up in some old man's safest nook, are worn-out, faded letters, telling of struggles and hopes in that long contest, that would make their writers' names bright on the nation's record, were not the number of those who rendered that our golden age so countless. Pious is the task of tracing the services of some revered ancestor, who gave whatever he had to give, when his country called, but whose name is not now remembered. Those days are fast becoming to our younger race almost mythical, so that every living word from the actors in them is of use in vivifying scenes that else would seem dim fable.
From a somewhat bulky bundle of yellow, tattered letters, long cherished with fond and filial care, a few are selected to interest the readers of the "Atlantic," who, it is supposed, will first be glad to know a little about their writer.
Dr. Isaac Foster was born in Charlestown, Massachusetts, on the 28th of August, 1740. His father, in early life a sea-captain, making frequent voyages between Boston and Europe, was for many years a prominent citizen of Charlestown, participating largely in the measures that preceded and led to the Revolution. At the age of eighteen, Dr. Foster graduated at Harvard, in the class of 1758. He then studied medicine under Dr. Lloyd of Boston, and afterwards completed his studies in England. He married, as his first wife, Martha, daughter of Thaddeus Mason of Cambridge, and at her death, some years later, Mary, daughter of Richard Russell of Charlestown. In his profession he achieved a considerable reputation, acquired a large practice, and numbered among his pupils Doctors Bartlett, Welch, and Eustis.
But while he was working his way to position and influence, more exciting themes began to attract his attention. With the earliest signs of coming conflict he took a determined stand on the Colonial side. In the town-meetings of the day he seems to have been prominent, and his name appears on most of the important committees appointed by the town in reference to public affairs. Thus, when, as early as November, 1772, the Committee of Correspondence in Boston called upon the other towns "to stand firm as one man," his name is found upon a committee appointed to answer this letter and prepare instructions to the representative of the town in the General Court.[A]
[Footnote A: FROTHINGHAM'S History of Charlestown, p. 286.]
He was also one of a committee appointed to consult with the committees of other towns concerning the expected importation of a quantity of tea. This was November 24th. On the 22d of December of the same year, a petition numerously signed was presented to the selectmen, asking that a meeting might be called to take some effectual measures to prevent the consumption of tea. Among the signatures is Dr. Foster's.[B]
[Footnote B: FROTHINGHAM'S History of Charlestown, p. 293.]
He was elected a delegate to the Convention in the County of Middlesex, in August, 1774, and a member of the first Provincial Congress of Massachusetts, in October of the same year. Early in 1775, he was appointed a surgeon, and was, for some months, at the head of the military medical department, while General Ward commanded at Cambridge. The day after the battle of Concord, at the urgent request of General Ward and Dr. Warren, he gave up his private practice, then very large, to attend the wounded. On the 18th of June, he was appointed by the Committee of Safety to attend the men wounded on the previous day at the battle of Bunker's Hill. He was soon after appointed Surgeon of the State Hospital, and by General Washington, on the discovery of the treachery of Dr. Church, in October, Director-General, pro tem., of the American Hospital Department. Congress soon nominated to this post Dr. John Morgan of Philadelphia, Dr. Foster remaining as the oldest surgeon in the hospital.
It seemed necessary, before selecting some of Dr. Foster's letters, to give this account of his earlier life, to show that he was no soldier of fortune or eleventh-hour laborer, but that his sympathies were enlisted and his aid given among the earliest of the friends of a then doubtful cause,—and that he ventured influence, wealth, and professional fame, and abandoned home and ease, at what seemed to him the call of his country.
The first extracts shall be from a letter to his wife, dated