posted 11-13-2005 03:52 PM            

The cup reads:
"To
Arpad G. Gerster, M.D.
In grateful recognition of the care and skill to which I am beholden for relief from a malady of many years.
April 4th 1896.
Roger A. Pryor."

It measures 9.5"High, 13,5" Wide, 6.5" Diameter
It weighs approx. 59 oz.

Arpad G. Gerster, M.D.
Department of Neurosurgery - Mount Sinai School of Medicine New York, NY

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...... In the 1890s the improvement in antiseptic technique allowed more complex surgery including more frequent opening of the cranium. The practice by a surgeon of sharpening his dull knife on his shoe in the operating room gave way to the practice of antisepsis and asepsis. In fact, in 1888, general surgeon Dr. Arpad G. Gerster, a recent immigrant and the most active of the four surgical chiefs, published Rules of Aseptic and Antiseptic Surgery. Interested in neurosurgery, Dr. Gerster pioneered surgery for epilepsy. He was responsible for the early training of Dr. Charles Elsberg and Dr. Ernest Sachs who ultimately became the world's first professor of Neurological Surgery at Washington University Medical School.

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Roger Atkinson Pryor
Virtual American Biographies

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Pryor, Roger Atkinson, lawyer, born near Petersburg, Virginia, 19 July, 1828. He was graduated at Hampden Sidney college in 1845, and at the University of Virginia, three years later, studied law, and was admitted to the bar, but entered journalism. He joined the staff of the Washington " Union," and was afterward editor of the Richmond " Enquirer." He was sent, at twenty-seven on a special mission to Greece by President Pierce. In 1856 he opposed William L. Yancey's proposition to reopen the slave-trade. He was an ardent advocate of state-rights, and established a daily paper, the "South," at Richmond, in which he represented the extreme views of the Virginia Democracy. His aggressive course and the intense utterance of his convictions led to several duels. He was elected to congress in 1859 to fill a vacancy, and was re-elected in 1860, but did not take his seat. While in that body he made various fiery speeches, and in the excited condition of the public mind preceding the civil war was often involved in passionate discussions with his northern opponents. One of these, John F. Potter (q. v.), replied to him with similar acrimony, and was challenged, Mr. Potter named bowie-knives as the weapons, and the Virginian's seconds refused to allow their principal to fight with arms which they pronounced barbarous. This challenge created an uproar throughout the country, and was accompanied with severe and characteristic comments on the principals from the northern and southern press. Mr. Pryor was eager for war, and visited Charleston to witness the firing on Sumter, and its surrender. He was sent to the provisional Confederate congress at Richmond, and elected to the first regular congress. Soon afterward he entered the Confederate army as a colonel, and was made a brigadier-general after the battle of Williamsburg. He resigned, 26 August, 1863, was taken prisoner in 1864, and confined for some time in Fort Lafavette. After the surrender of the Confederate armies, he urged on the south the adoption of a policy of acquiescence and loyalty to the government. He went to New York in 1865, settled there as a lawyer, and is still practising. He has taken no part in politics since the war, confining himself exclusively to his profession. He is the author of many speeches and literary addresses, and has been given the degree of LL.D. by Hampden Sidney college.

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Anecdote of Roger A. Pryor

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The following occurred during the attack on Fort Sumter in 1861. Roger A. Pryor, of Virginia, ex-member of Congress, was one of the second deputation that waited upon Major Anderson. He was the very embodiment of Southern chivalry. Literally dressed to kill, bristling with bowie-knives and revolvers, like a walking arsenal, he appeared to think himself individually capable of capturing the fort, without any extraneous assistance. Inside of the fort he seemed to think himself master of every thing—monarch of all he surveyed—and, in keeping with this pretension, seeing upon the table what appeared to be a glass of brandy, drank it without ceremony. Surgeon (afterward General) Crawford, who had witnessed the feat, approached him and said: "Sir, what you have drank is poison—it was the iodide of potassium—you are a dead man!" The representative of chivalry instantly collapsed, bowie-knives, revolvers and all, and passed into the hands of Surgeon Crawford, who, by purgings, pumpings, and pukings, defeated his own prophecy in regard to his fate. Mr. Pryor left Fort Sumter a "wiser if not a better man."

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Thanks to Shay Oron for the opportunity to photograph this.

posted 11-13-2005 11:46 PM            

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The "Monster Knife" of John Fox Potter

Giant knife presented to John Fox Potter by Missouri Republicans after Potter's threatened duel with a Virginia congressman, 1860.

John Fox Potter was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives as a Republican from Wisconsin in 1856 and went to Washington during a turbulent period in Congressional history. Conflicting ideologies, customs, and personalities threatened to tear Congress apart. The issues of slavery and states' rights deeply divided the nation's lawmakers, and debate and compromise routinely yielded to verbal confrontation, personal humiliations, and physical assaults.

On April 5, 1860, Republican Owen Lovejoy of Illinois delivered a fiery anti-slavery speech in the House of Representatives. Representative Roger Pryor, a Democratic secessionist from Virginia, objected to Lovejoy's bellicose manner, but John Potter rose to Lovejoy's defense, arguing that he be allowed to express himself. Days later, Pryor and Potter squabbled further about the official record of the incident published in the report of the debates of the House.

Believing that Potter offended his honor, Pryor challenged him to a duel. Potter accepted the challenge and chose to fight with bowie knives. Pryor's second refused the selection of weapon as "vulgar, barbarous, and inhuman." Potter's second replied that the custom of dueling itself was "barbarous and inhuman." The two posturing Congressmen exchanged a flurry of correspondence and District of Columbia police arrested both men to keep the peace. The duel never occurred.

Partisan print media sensationalized the entire affair and enflamed sectional sentiments. Northern newspapers condemned dueling as a vulgar Southern practice and lambasted Pryor either for issuing the challenge or for backing down from it. Potter's Democratic opponents in Wisconsin, where dueling was outlawed, demanded his resignation. They deemed the entire matter "disgusting" and, with an election approaching, suspected political motives behind Potter's grandstanding. Republicans nationwide, however, made Potter into a hero and supporters from across the country sent him knives of all sizes.

One month after the Potter-Pryor affair, the Republican Party held its national convention in Chicago and nominated Abraham Lincoln for president. At the convention, delegates from the slave state of Missouri presented John Potter with this 31-pound, 6-foot-long folding knife to commemorate his "victory" over Roger Pryor. It was a highlight of the convention and earned national press exposure when Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper dubbed it the "monster bowie knife."

From then on, Potter became widely known as "Bowie Knife" Potter. He kept the oversized knife in his Wisconsin home until the number of visitors who wanted to see it became bothersome. He donated the knife to Lawrence College in Appleton and the college subsequently donated it to the Wisconsin Historical Society in 1957. Today, this knife remains a symbol of the political discord that led to the Civil War.

The knife was manufactured by the New England Cutlery Company of Wallingford, Connecticut and engraved by Richard J. Compton of St. Louis. The engraving on one side of the knife's blade reads, "Presented to John F. Potter of Wisconsin by the Republicans of Missouri 1860". The other side is engraved with the pun, "Will always meet a Pryor engagement."

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posted 11-14-2005 11:07 AM            

Must have provided the cutting edge of the antislavery movement???

(Couldn't resist)