[Extract from the papers of the Chicago Meteorological Congress, August, 1893.] 
1.-THE CONNECTION OF THE ARMY MEDICAL DEPARTMENT 
WITH THE DEVELOPMENT OF METEOROLOGY 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 
Maj. Charles Smart, U. S. A. 
Meteorological science in the United States was conceived and 
brought forth by the Army Medical Department. It was nurtured 
carefully as well in the then unknown West as in the East, and it 
gained strength year by year. Its progress was occasionally an- 
nounced from the office of the Surgeon General of the Army by such 
men as Forry, Espy, and Coolidge, and when it attained its maturity 
and was able to work its own way in the world, it was to one, once a 
member of the Army Medical Department, that it owed its establish- 
ment in its present prosperous line of business. The Weather Ser- 
vice of the United States may well be said to be the child of the Army 
Medical Department. 
Gen. Joseph Lovell, the first Surgeon General of the Army, ap- 
pointed in 1818, is usually credited with the honor of having insti- 
tuted the Army Meteorological Service, although some of the credit 
is diverted to the then Secretary of War, the Hon. J. C. Calhoun, be- 
cause he approved of the rules submitted by the Surgeon General, and 
so gave them the force of law. In urging the approval of the rule 
requiring a diary of the weather to be kept, Surg. Gen. Lovell re- 
marked that " Every physician who makes a science of his profes- 
sion or arrives at eminence in it will keep a journal of this nature, as 
the influence of weather and climate upon diseases, especially epidemic, 
is perfectly well known. From the circumstances of the soldier, their 
effects upon diseases of the Army are peculiarly interesting, as by 
proper management they may in a great measure be obviated. To 
this end every surgeon should be furnished with a good thermometer, 
and in addition to a diary of the weather, should note everything 
relative to the topography of his station, the climate, complaints 
prevalent in the vicinity, etc., that may tend to discover the causes of 
diseases, to the promotion of health, and the improvement of medical 
science." 
Every reference to the subject published from the office of the 
Surgeon General gives credit to Dr. Lovell. In one of the volumes of 
meteorological tables it is stated, for instance, that " In 1819 a system 
of meteorological observations was commenced and zealously pro- 
moted by Surg. Gen. Joseph Lovell. The unpublished records extend 
to 1820." Even Surg. T. G. Mower, who, in 1843, read a paper at the 2 
centennial anniversary of the American Philosophical Society on the 
connection of the Army Medical Department with meteorological 
science, states positively that during the year 1818 the surgeons at 
military posts were directed to keep regular records of the weather 
and transmit them quarterly to the Medical Bureau at Washington 
and that the earliest registers thus transmitted and on file in the 
Surgeon General's Office are dated January, 1819. 
Nevertheless it appears that Surg. Gen. Lovell's credit must be 
restricted to the fact that he appreciated the value of the existing 
rules of the Medical Department, in regard to meteorological observa- 
tions, and continued them instead of dropping them out, as he might 
have done. The earliest meteorological journal on file in the office of 
the Surgeon General, instead of bearing date January, 1819, is dated 
at Cambridge, Mass., July, 1816. On its first page is written the fol- 
lowing : 
Among the rules for the medical staff of the Army of the United States is that which 
makesit the duty of each hospital surgeon and director of a department "to keep a 
diary of the weather, together with an account of the medical topography of the coun- 
try in which he serves." Wherefore the following sketch of Boston and its vicinity, 
and particularly of Charlestown, is offered to the commander in chief, Maj. Gen. Brown, 
by Benjamin Waterhouse, M. D., hospital surgeon and director of Department No. 2, 
Northern Division, as a first step in fulfilling this desideratum. 
Cambridge, July, 1816. 
From this introductory sentence the inference is warranted that 
this meteorological report was a new thing to Dr. Waterhouse, and 
that no doubt it was the first of the kind that he had submitted. In 
going back through the Military Laws, Rules, and Regulations of the 
United States, an order may be found, dated May 2,1814, which makes 
it a duty of hospital surgeons to keep a diary of the weather. Prior 
to this date neither the regulations of the Army nor the rules of the 
Medical Department made any reference to such a duty. Dr. James 
Tilton, of Delaware, was then the Physician and Surgeon General of 
the Army. He had been appointed in 1812 on account of his record 
as a hospital surgeon during the Revolutionary war and of his pub- 
lished views on hospital organization, which had been presented to 
Congress at the close of that war. As the order directing the keeping 
of a diary of the weather was issued during his administration, the 
credit of originating it belongs officially to him. He was occupied at 
the time on the northern frontier looking after the interests of the 
sick and wounded. The battles of Chippewa, Bridgewater, and Platts- 
burg took place during this summer, and one would have supposed 
that Army medical officers would have had more urgent matters to 
attend to than the observation of the weather; but when it is con- 
sidered that Tilton had devoted much of his life to the organization 
and administration of hospitals, and that only hospital surgeons and 
those elevated to the position of medical directors were called upon 3 
to make the observations, there seems to be little doubt that the 
credit of instituting meteorological records at our permanent posts 
and hospitals should belong actually as well as officially to this 
officer. 
The meteorological journal, to which the topographical remarks of 
Dr. Waterhouse form an introduction, gives three observations daily, 
7 a. m., and 2 and 9 p. m., on the barometer, thermometer, face of 
sky, and winds, with a column for remarks. The condition of the 
sky is indicated by hieroglyphics, such as Q fair, mostly fair, 
-== few clouds, ZZZ mostly cloudy, = = cloudy, rain, £ snow, 
and the force of the wind by a numerical exponent to the letters in- 
dicating direction, thus SW2. 
The regulations of the Medical Department issued in 1818, imme- 
diately after the appointment of Dr. Lovell as Surgeon General of 
the Army, spoke thus of the duties of a hospital surgeon : " He shall 
keep a diary of the weather in the form and manner prescribed, 
noting everything of importance relating to the medical topography 
of his station, the climate, complaints prevalent in the vicinity," etc. 
Of an assistant surgeon: "He shall make the proper*entries in the 
book containing the diary of the weather." Of a regimental sur- 
geon : " He shall observe all the regulations given for the surgeon 
attending a general hospital in relation to * * * the book con- 
taining a diary of the weather, the medical topography of his post 
or station, etc.; and if both the regimental mates be present the 
senior shall see that the diary of the weather be properly kept." Of a 
post surgeon : " He shall observe all the regulations given for a sur- 
geon attending a general hospital in respect to the books to be kept." 
It seems, therefore, that although Dr. Tilton instituted the records, 
the circumstances attending the war with Great Britain prevented an 
efficient compliance with the requirements of his order of May 2, 
1814, and it was left to Dr. Lovell, favored by a prolonged period of 
peace and prosperity, to take up the suggestion and develop its use- 
fulness. 
In 1826 the first results of the work of the Army Medical Depart- 
ment in this direction were given to the world in a volume entitled 
" Meteorological Register for the years 1822-25, inclusive, from ob- 
servations made by the surgeons of the Army at the military posts of 
the United States; prepared under the direction of Joseph Lovell, 
M. D., Surgeon General of the U. S. Army, Washington, 1826." The 
meteorological tables in this volume were intended as a contribution 
and stimulus to the solution of the question whether, in a series of 
years, there is any material change in the climate of a country and, 
if so, how far it depends upon the cultivation of the soil, density of 
population, etc.; for at the time of publication contradictory opin- 
ions were held, some contending that as population increased and 4 
civilization extended the climate became warmer, others that it be- 
came colder, and others again that there was no change. The military 
posts from which observations were given numbered 18, including 
Washington, and were situated between N. 27° 57' and N. 46° 39' and 
W. 67° 04' and W. 95° 43'. Fort Snelling, near the junction of the 
St. Peters and the Mississippi rivers, was the extreme northern and 
Cantonment Clinch, near Pensacola, the extreme southern station. 
The posts having the highest elevation were Council Bluffs, believed 
to be about 800 feet, and Fort Snelling, about 780 feet above the 
sea level. The observations from all the posts were arranged in 
monthly tables with a consolidation for each year and a similar 
consolidation for the whole period. The latitude and longitude 
of each place of observation were given, the mean temperature at 
7 a. m., 2 and 9 p. m., the aggregate of mean temperature, the 
highest and lowest degrees and the range, the wind expressed in days 
of prevalence from each of 8 different points of the compass, and the 
weather in days of fairness, cloudiness, rain or snow. It was the in- 
tention, if similar observations could be obtained for eight or ten 
years, to collect such as had been made at an early period of the 
settlement of the country and to ascertain what changes had taken 
place in the Atlantic States, either in the mean temperature, the 
range of the thermometer, the winds, or the weather. 
The next publication was much more elaborate and embodied the 
data of the first volume by way of an appendix, in order to present 
the whole of the observations at one view. " Meteorological Register 
for the years 1826-30, from observations made by the surgeons of 
the Army and others at the military posts of the United States, pre- 
pared under the direction of Thomas Lawson, M. D., Surgeon General, 
U. S. Army. Philadelphia, 1840. To which is appended the Meteoro- 
logical Register for the years 1822-25 , compiled, etc. (published for 
the use of the Medical Officers of the Army)." The tables in the 
record for 1826-30 were similar to those in the previous publication 
to permit of comparison and consolidation. The compilation and 
able discussion of the results presented in this volume were the work of 
Assistant Surg. Samuel Forry, U. S. Army. For the better presen- 
tation of the observed facts the country was divided into a northern, 
middle, and southern division. In the first, on the sea coast of New 
England, the influence of the ocean was found to modify the range of 
the thermometer and the mean temperature of the seasons. In the 
interior of New York the range increased and the seasons were vio- 
lently contrasted. Further west near the Great Lakes a climate sim- 
ilar to that of the seaboard was again found; and in the interior 
beyond them extreme ranges became the rule. For example, the 
mean temperature of Atlantic and interior posts in the same latitude 
was found to be the same, but in the East that of winter was 6.05r 5 
higher, of spring 4.13° lower, of summer 8.71° lower, and of autumn 
0.40° higher than in the West; and the influence of altitude was ex- 
cluded from the observations which gave these results. The influence 
of the ocean was expressed also by the fact that the number of wet 
or foggy days on the New England coast was one-half greater than in 
the interior. 
Similar contrasts in the seasons and weather were discovered also 
in comparing the Lake posts with those beyond. The posts selected 
were Forts Brady, Mackinac, and Snelling, from 575 to 780 feet above 
the sea level. In the middle division similar laws were found to pre- 
vail. The seasons grew less uniform as the West was penetrated. 
Washington City and Fortress Monroe showed less difference between 
the mean temperature of summer and winter than Jefferson Barracks 
or Fort Gibson. In the southern division, bounded by the Gulf of 
Mexico, the seasons glided imperceptibly into each other, showing no 
great extremes. Thus, the difference between the mean temperature 
of the warmest and coldest month at Cantonment Brooke, in Florida, 
was only 17.68°, while that at Fort Snelling was 61.18°. It was 
developed further that the extremes of heat and cold did not occur 
at our most southern and northern posts, as these were situated on 
large bodies of water which exercised a modifying influence. Brady 
had a more equable climate than Snelling, and the mean summer 
temperature of Augusta, Ga., was greater than at the Florida posts. 
Lastly, it was discovered that the summer of a southern post differs 
from that of a northern one rather in its duration than in its inten- 
sity. In fact, the isotheral, isocheimal, and isothermal lines as far 
west as Fort Shelling became pretty well defined by a study of the 
observations thus far recorded. The prominent features of the cli- 
mate of the country having been thus outlined, it was expected that 
a continuance of the observations would in course of time permit of 
the composition of a complete meteorological chart. To this end the 
Surgeon General procured from Europe a number of Daniell's hygrom- 
eters for use at the more important stations, and De Witt's conical 
rain gauge was furnished to those posts not already provided with 
this instrument. 
About the same time was published a " Statistical report on the 
sickness and mortality in the Army of the United States, compiled 
from the records of the Surgeon General's and Adjutant General's 
Offices, embracing a period of twenty years, from January, 1819, to 
January, 1839, prepared under the direction of Thomas Lawson, 
M. D., Surgeon General, Washington, 1840." This work defined the 
sanitary conditions of each of the posts, detailed the more important 
incidents of their medical history, and concluded with a discussion 
on the relationship of climate and its seasonal differences to mor- 
tality, and the prevalence of such diseases as fevers, diarrhoeas, 6 
catarrhs, and pulmonary diseases, rheumatism, etc. Two years later 
Forry republished the matter of his meteorological and statistical 
reports as a work on "The climate of the United States and its 
endemic influences." New York, 1842. 8°. 
When Dr. Forry resigned in 1840 Mr. J. P. Espy became attached 
to the Surgeon General's Office to collate the meteorological journals 
and study the steadily accumulating mass of facts. This gentleman, 
an enthusiast in meteorological science, was already well known by 
his book " On the Philosophy of Storms." He immediately sent out 
a circular letter urging the keeping of meteorological journals by vol- 
untary observers throughout the country, by colleges, high schools, 
naval and lighthouse stations, etc., on the forms prescribed for the 
Medical Department of the Army, especially requesting co-operation 
in his efforts to develop the phases of storms. By charting on 
skeleton maps the observations taken as a storm was passing he 
expected to determine its shape and size, whether round or oblong, 
and if the latter, whether it moved side foremost, end foremost, or 
obliquely, its velocity and direction, together with the direction 
of the wind at and beyond its borders, the barometric and ther- 
mometric changes accompanying it, and the extent to which such 
changes were felt. In 1843 he received journals from 50 observers 
who noted barometer changes and from 60 others who had no barom- 
eter, and in the preparation of his First Report to the Surgeon Gen- 
eral of the Army he utilized the observations of the months of Jan- 
uary, February, and March of that year. Twenty-nine beautifully 
engraved charts accompanied his report and illustrated the weather 
of the three months. On these charts the direction and length of 
the arrows showed the direction and force of the wind, the points 
being near the places of observation. The rain or snow fall was 
indicated by figures in red. A long black line represented the 
various maxima of pressure as shown by the barometer and a long 
red line the various minima. In brief, his deductions were that 
storms travel from west to east and have a central line of minimum 
pressure often of great length and at right angles to the direction of 
its advance. The storm in fact crosses the country like a line of 
battle, sometimes nearly straight, but generally with a convexity 
eastward at some point as if an impulse was carrying it forward 
there at a greater rate than the average of 36 miles an hour. The 
wind sweeps inward from all directions toward the storm center, its 
force and the extent of the disturbance around the line of diminished 
pressure being proportioned to the suddenness and magnitude of the 
barometric fall; when the latter is great the disturbance may extend 
for hundreds of miles, and is always accompanied by rain or snow. 
Fluctuations are greater at the north than at the south. During the 
passage of a storm the wind passes from easterly to westerly by way 7 
of the north in the northern parts of the country, by way of the south 
in the southern parts. Storms usually begin in the far west beyond 
the sphere of the observations then made. Meanwhile the area of 
maximum pressure, also linear and disposed longitudinally, retires 
eastwardly before the advance of the storm and disappears over the 
Atlantic Ocean as the storm line reaches the western border of New 
England, after which the line of maximum pressure reappears in the 
southwest, following up the storm that is now withdrawing beyond 
the Atlantic coast line. There is little wind near the line of greatest 
pressure, and in direction it is generally away from the line. 
Mr. Espy concluded his report by a suggestion which has since then 
been happily carried into effect: 
It is highly desirable to surround storms and keep them constantly in view from their 
beginning to their end. Now, as the barometer generally sinks more during the pas- 
sage of our great winter storms in the northern part of the United States than in the 
southern, is it not probable that the northern half of many of these storms is entirely 
beyond the bounds of our observations? And, as these storms certainly reach New- 
foundland in their progress toward the east, is it not probable that they do not break up 
before they advance far into the ocean ? May not some of them even reach the shores 
of Europe? Under these circumstances would not the governments of England and 
France, if they were requested by the proper authorities, order the masters of the 
numerous steamers which now ply the Atlantic to send copies of their journals to Wash- 
ington City to be collated with those received now from so many other quarters ? 
What high utilities to the mariner, and through the mariner to all mankind, might 
not reasonably be anticipated from such a system of wide-spread, simultaneous obser- 
vations, continued long enough to compare with each other, not merely the storms of 
different seasons but the storms of different years. 
The merest glance at Espy's charts demonstrates the fact that tele- 
graphic communication was the only thing wanting to enable that 
enthusiast to plan the very weather service that we have at the pres- 
ent day. Meanwhile, owing to the impetus which he had given to 
meteorology, a board of officers, consisting of Drs. Mower, Steinecke, 
and Cuyler, formulated " Directions for taking Meteorological Obser- 
vations adopted by the Medical Department of the Army," which 
were published in 1844. Observations were required daily at a little 
before sunrise, at 9 a. m., and 3 and 9 p. m. on the barometer and its 
attached thermometer, the detached thermometer, the wind, and the 
weather; the wet bulb was noted twice only, before sunrise and at 3 
p. in. Bunten's siphon barometer, the wet bulb, and a conical rain 
guage were issued. Tables were given for the conversion of the 
French barometric scale into English inches, and for the translation 
of centigrade degrees into those of Fahrenheit's scale. Clearness of 
sky was directed to be indicated by the numerals 0-10, the first 
representing no clearness, the last no cloud; the force of wind was to 
be reported in like manner, 0 signifying a calm and 10 a violent hur- 
ricane. Hourly observations were called for on the 21st days of 
March, June, September, and December, beginning at 6 a. m. and 
ending at the same hour next day. 8 
Evidently the Medical Department at this time intended to give 
renewed energy to the development of meteorological science, for Dr. 
Mower's paper, already cited and which may be regarded as official, 
closes with a cordial invitation to colleges, scientific institutions, and 
individual students of meteorology to co-operate with the department, 
placing its forms at their disposition and stating that all contribu- 
tions will be cheerfully acknowledged in the publications of the de- 
partment. Arrangements, he says, have been made for prosecuting 
meteorological inquiries with renewed diligence; and a medical 
officer will shortly be detailed to give his chief time and attention to 
the subject, to arrange and digest the matter collected, and to pre- 
pare the results for publication. 
It was not, however, until 1851 that the next publication from the 
office of the Surgeon General was issued. " Meteorological Register 
for twelve years, from 1831 to 1842, inclusive, compiled from observa- 
tions made by the officers of the Medical Department of the Army at 
the military posts of the United States, prepared under the direction 
of Bvt. Brig. Gen. Thomas Lawson, Surgeon General, U. S. Army, 
Washington, 1851." And notwithstanding the delay in publication 
no effort was made to collate the observations and deduce general 
results from the mass of facts presented. The tables embraced the 
records of 62 posts lying between N. 24° 20', Key West Barracks, and 
N. 47° 15', Fort Kent, Me., and between W. 66° 58', Fort Sullivan, at 
Eastport, Me., and W. 95° 10', Fort Gibson, Cherokee Nation, Ark. 
Five years later appeared a " Statistical Report on the Sickness and 
Mortality of the Army of the United States, compiled from the Re- 
ports of the Surgeon General's Office, embracing a period of sixteen 
years from January, 1839, to January, 1855, prepared, etc., by R. H. 
Coolidge, Assistant Surgeon, U. S. Army, Washington, 1856." This 
volume contained a series of tables, one for each of 159 posts, giving 
the mean results of the observations of temperature for each month, 
season, and year during the entire period of the observations at each. 
The rainfall, wind, and weather were given in another series of tables. 
A similar statistical report was issued in 1860, covering the period 
of five years, January, 1855, to January, 1860, also by Dr. Coolidge. 
This brings us to the war of the rebellion, with the meteorological 
records of forty years before the public. The original reports had 
often been consulted by officers engaged in explorations for a railroad 
from the Mississippi to the Pacific and on various boundary surveys, 
and by those desirous of elucidating some special point in meteor- 
ology. From January, 1819, to January, 1841, the observations were 
made three times daily, at 7 a. m., 2 and 9 p. m.; in 1841 at sunrise, 
2 and 9 p. m.; in 1842 at sunrise, 2 p. m., sunset, and 9 p. m.; in 
1843-'55 at a little before sunrise, 9 a. m., and 2 and 9 p. m.; but as 
an extended examination of the records of the hourly observations 9 
showed that the mean of the observations taken at 7 a. m., and 2 and 
9 p. m. more nearly approximated the true daily mean than did the 
means of any of the four daily observations, orders were issued direct- 
ing a return to the three daily observations at those hours. 
In following up the connection of the Medical Department of the 
Army with the progress of meteorological science, it is proper at this 
stage to refer to the history of one member of the Department, Assist- 
ant Surg. A. J. Myer. This officer was appointed in 1854 and served 
until 1860, when he vacated his position to accept that of Signal Officer 
of the Army. During his frontier service he drafted a code of signals 
which, in 1858, was approved by a board of critical officers. With 
his efforts to build up a valuable signal service and the difficulties 
he encountered this paper has no concern, nor with his ultimate suc- 
cess in obtaining legislation for a signal corps organization at a time 
when, through the antagonism of the Secretary of War, he was relieved 
from its command. During the war of the rebellion the discovery 
and transmission of information regarding the movements of the 
enemy's forces and the well-being of our own absorbed all the energies 
of the newly-formed corps, but at its close in 1866, when the military 
establishment was reduced to a peace footing, Gen. Myer, who had 
happily been recalled to the head of the Signal Corps, looked natu- 
rally for some service or duty for his command in line with its 
military duties that would enable it to be of value to the country 
during the coming years of peace. Nonmilitary work by military 
men was no innovation in this country, for the Engineer Department 
of the Army had in times of peace surveyed the Western Territories, 
built bridges and levees, deepened rivers and harbors, and constructed 
many important works of internal improvement. Gen. Myer's six 
years of service as a post surgeon, during which he became familiar 
with the meteorological work of the Medical Department and the 
progress of storms across the continent as developed by Mr. Espy, 
led him to urge upon Congress the advantageous possibilities sug- 
gested by the observation of storms and the prompt signalling of 
their approach. Not until February, 1870, however, was he author- 
ized to undertake this work, when he immediately established 66 sta- 
tions, equipping each observer as he himself had formerly been 
equipped by the Medical Department, but furnishing in addition an 
anemometer to obtain a more precise knowledge of the force of coming 
storms. Each observer transmitted his observations by telegraph to 
the central station at Headquarters of the Signal Corps, Washington, 
D. C., where all were plotted on a skeleton map and studied to de- 
termine the atmospheric conditions and the movements and forces of 
storms in precisely the same way that Mr. Espy dealt with the data 
which he received by mail long after the occurrence of the events. 
Mr. Espy knew how the storm had traveled; Gen. Myer knew how 
1 2 10 
the storm was traveling. This constituted the difference between 
the old and the new. The former published his knowledge of the 
completed event as a contribution to science and the possibilities of 
the future; the latter conveyed his knowledge of the coming event 
by telegraph and signals to all who were concerned in the progress of 
the passing storm. Subsequently, Gen. Myer established an Inter- 
national Weather Bulletin and Weather Map based on simultaneous 
observations, thus carrying into present practice the suggestion con- 
tained in that paragraph of Mr. Espy's report that has just been cited. 
Since 1874 all meteorological reports from Army Medical Officers 
have been turned over to the Chief Signal Officer or to his successor 
in charge of the Weather Bureau. It might be supposed that since 
the value of this Bureau has been so thoroughly established its im- 
portant position would render it wholly independent of the officers 
whose labors in the past had done so much to establish it; but this 
is not so. Meteorological observations have been discontinued at 
those military posts near which the Weather Bureau has installed its 
observers, but there are yet many parts of our vast country occupied 
by military posts where no station of the Weather Service has been 
established. At these military posts, some 50 in number, medical 
officers continue to make their meteorological observations as their 
predecessors did in the early days after the issuance of the order of May 
2, 1814, which made it the duty of hospital surgeons to keep a diary 
of the weather. 
Long and faithfully have the medical officers of the Army obeyed 
that order, and with honorable pride they can point to the results 
that have been achieved.