behind AotW

These are pictures of Doctor Nehemiah Nickerson as a youth, then early and late, respectively, in his medical career.

The first is of him at about age 17 (c. 1850). In the US Census of that year he was living with his parents and siblings in Bristol, Massachusetts where his father was a dresser tender. Young Nehemiah was listed as a card guider. Both are jobs operating machines in a textile mill. Within a year or two he was a student at Wesleyan University in Middletown, CT.

This next one shows him in uniform as Assistant Surgeon of the 16th Connecticut Volunteer Infantry, probably taken less than a month before he found himself under fire on the battlefield at Antietam in September 1862. It’s from the Connecticut State Library.

The third is from 1900 or later, after he had been a practicing physician in Meriden, CT for about 40 years. The first and third photographs are thanks to great-granddaughter Cindy Wales-Murphy.