DEATH OF DR.HENRY.

Evening Post, Volume XLVII, Issue 84, 10 April 1894, Page 2

DEATH OF DR. HENRY.

4 Theie is a general and profound feeling of grief and regret in the city to-day, whioh the telegraph wires have ero now oarried to alj the towns and hamlets of tho oolony, at the passing ont of one of Wellington's chief and moat popular and respected citizens, and ouo of the leading members of the medical profession in New Zealand. Dr. Joseph Honry passed away just before 11 o'okok last night, after a very brief, unexpected, and painful illness. It is only the other day that he took train to Hawked Bay with Sir Patrick Buckley to tond and oonEolo a oolleague and friend in core dibtress, and we are told that his genial and kindly presence at Dr. Cahill's bedside produced bo excellent a mental reaotion in the patient that the most alarming symptoms began to dibapjiear. Dr. Cahill had noted on a scrap of paper by his bedbide his own diagnosis and the symptoms as he felt them. Full of vitality , good humour, and sympathy, Dr. Henry's presenoe theio in all human probability saved his colleague's ifo, and ho returned to Wellington full of health and spirits, but still anxious fir his 'riend. Now, tho life then iv d.nger lihb triumphed over disease, and tho life whioh, to the kon o r mqn, seemed assured of long and useful lease, is cut short. The patient lives — the physician is doad. It was a sudden and a deadly malady whioh blotted out tho lifo, but it was ono which, with tbo practised skill and prophutio insight of tho physioian, the sufferer hiuisolf saw tho eudingof . Hewo s at the Government Insurance Department during tho forenoon, attending to his duties as C kief Medical Offioor. Ho was called to examine a lunatic at tho Police effioe, and left the Insurance office at 1 o'clock, in apparently good health and spirits, for his aurgory, preparatory to fulfilling his. other duty. JUut on his way he Buddenly suffered violent pain in the lumbar region. Renal colio was suspected. Dr. Auson was called in to assist Dr. King (Dr. Henry's profosßionnl assistant), and sub-cutaneous injection of morphia tilhvted tho pain. The sufferer resumed his won tod ohcerfulness, but presently ho told his medical friends that the pain which the anodyne had for the momont allayed would assert itself again and ascend to his heart— that ho fearod it to be an attack of angina peotoris. Therefore, he said, ho had little time to lose. Material* were procured, and in the presence of hia two medioal friends he wade a will, which they witnessed. The diagnosis proved prophotio and all too aooarato. Dr. Henry, whoso skill hud givon many a aufforer another day, and day*, aud years to live, was not himself destined to look again upon the snu at its rising. As tho night deepened, tho bhadow of death fell upon the hoU6o, and the daughters who watohed at tho bodbido beoaino doubly orphans/ A genial, good-humoured, Renoroue, and culturod Irishman, trained in famous Trinity Collogo, Dublin, Dr. Henry's name was a. household word from one end of the colony to the other. He was born about 1835, and became Licentiate of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1862. Like many another clover young Colt, his vision roamed boyond hia " most diatrossfnl country," and he sought a future and a homo in now lands beyond the seas. Now Zca.and was his ohoice, and soon after qualifying he cim& to our conntry and volunteered as a Burgeon during the great Waikato war. In this capacity he won tho 'regard and friendship and esteem of his oomrades, for his bkill and kindness were second only to tho courage with which he ministered to tho suffering in the fiold and in tho hospital tent, apparently regardless of the bullets which olten fell tbiok around him. Iho war came to an ond, and tho young burgeon , seized with the glamonr of the goldiields, went with the thousands who tbt n flocked to tho West Coast, and with CharleLton as his bead-quarters faced the perils of flood and mountain, darkness and storm, in carrying feuccour to striokon miners, with the same disregard for himself whioh he had bhown under the tiro of the Maori toa. And the porils of " Iho Coast" then woro groat, as every " old timer" knows, for on the bed of the l'aoific, beneath the rushing waters of tho great rivers, and in guloh and gorge, ore vice and cliff, bleach now tbo bonea of huudrods of brave men who disappeared from ken in tho days of those hardy pioneers. In gratitnde for great service, the diggers of the iSullor made the only tangible return in their power. They olocted the man who bad succoured and aided them in their distress ai their representative in the Parliament of their country. From 1876 to 1879 Dr. Henry . sat as member foe the Bullor, gaining reputation for shrewd common eenae and bread political sympathies. Then he retired from aotive participation in politios, and revisited the Old Countries in order to bring himself up to date in the methods of the physioian and surgeon which had boen developing while ho was warring with flood, and bullet, and sickness in tho Btrenuous life of tho young community. He walked the great London and Dublin Hospitals, and in 1880 passed as Licentiate of tho Royal College of Physicians, London. Meantime he had married, securing a helpmeet in the person of Miss Armstrong, who died some three yeara ago, leaving bohind her two young daughters, now well known in Wellington sooial and musical oiroleSj aud a son, now aged 24, and who has bnt this year passed his medical examinations and is a junior physician at St. Bartholomew's, bnt who has boen cabled to atd will return at onoe. On returning to tho colony, Dr. Henry settled in Wellington, wh( ro he soou won the respect and regard of the citizens, and became an integral element of the community. He was Chief Medical Officer to tho Government Insurance Departmont, Medical Officer to tho port (tho flags of tho shipping are now fluttering half-mast in his memory), a member of tho .board of Governors of Wellington College, a Jnstico of tho Peaco, and a prominent member of medical and scientific civilisations. Dr. Henry was a cousin of Matthew Henry, tho Irish patriot. It wus only at 8 p.m. yosterday— threo brief hours before ho breathed his last -that tho telegraphic bulletin received respecting Dr. Cahill'a condition was sent to iJr. Henry, who was greatly pleased at learnit>i; from it that the danger had passed, and his patient was doing 1 well Deceased's life was insured in the Government Office for .£2OOO. The funeral will take placo at 9 a.m. tomorrow. Deceased will bo buried in tho Sydneystreot Cemetery, whoro Mrs. Henry's grave is.