Until the middle of the XIXth century in Europe, pain was considered to be essential for the process of healing.
‘Avoiding pain during operations is a chimera that would be impossible to accept nowadays’.
In April 1844, in the United States, Dr Garner Quincy Colton formed a travelling circus which had acts where volunteers inhaled laughing gas (nitrous oxide). At the same time ‘frolic parties’ were held with the inhalation of nitrous oxide or ether.
Crawford Williamson Long was a doctor and pharmacist at the town of Jefferson in Georgia and took part in such parties where ether was inhaled and produced a calm sleep. Long used ether for the first time on the 30th March 1842 for the removal of a neck tumour from his friend James M. Venable. He used the technique seven times in the following years but did not publish the details.
Horace Wells, a dentist at Hartford, Connecticut was present at a circus show put on by Colton. His neighbour, who had inhaled ether had a fall and injured the calf of his leg. At the end of the show Wells asked him if he was in pain and he replied that he had felt nothing. He realised the relation between anaesthesia and analgesia. The following day he had an infected molar removed by his assistant, having inhaled nitrous oxide and felt nothing. He published locally and anaesthetised 15 patients with the same results. Following advice from Morton in Boston, he gave a demonstration at the Massachusetts General Hospital, but the patient cried out and he was dismissed as a charlatan.
William Thomas Green Morton , a dentist in Boston researched ether between 1845 and 1846. You can see a silent film produced in 1936 by the anaesthetic team at Massachusetts General Hospital of the first general anaesthetic given at the hospital. The film highlights the variability of the clinical effects of the products used. His former teacher, Charles Thomas Jackson directed him to a pharmacy which provided ether which produced constant anaesthetic effects. In the afternoon of the 30th September 1846 Morton tried the ether on himself successfully. In the evening of the same day, he successfully removed an infected tooth from Eben Frost under ether inhalation. The next day, he published his discovery in a Boston journal.
Encouraged by his daily results, he contacted Professor John Collins Warren, chief surgeon at the Massachusetts General Hospital to arrange a formal demonstration in the operating theatre, known nowadays as the ‘ether dome.’
On the 16th October, 1846 the amphitheatre was full. The patient, Edward Gilbert Abbott had a tumour in the neck. He was attached to an armchair. Morton was late, due to having made some modifications to his apparatus. Warren was about to start the operation when Morton arrived with Eben Frost who explained to the patient how well things had gone for him a few days earlier. Morton anaesthetised the patient and Warren operated for 10 to 15 minutes during which time the patient did not cry out. When he awoke, he confirmed that he had felt nothing. There was an ovation in the room after hearing the celebrated comment by Warren
No Gentlemen, this is not a humbug! We are not the object of an hallucination; we have just been present at a major event in the history of surgery. Our craft has been delivered for ever from horror.
News of the technique was sent to London in the middle of December 1846 and anaesthesia was immediately spread to Europe and throughout the world. In France, the first use of ether took place on the 15th December 1846 delivered by Willis Fischer to Jobert de Lamballe but this was a failure. Malgaigne repeated the technique and published details of the first anaesthetics in France on the 12th January 1847. Ten days later Charrière made his first anaesthetic apparatus. In 1847 within six months there were 76 communications sent to the Academy of Medicine and Science in Paris.
James Young Simpson , a doctor in Edinburgh and two of his colleagues inhaled various compounds in search of a new anaesthetic. One evening, his wife found them in a comatose state having inhaled chloroform. On the 4th November 1847, Simpson performed the first anaesthetic with chloroform which would become rival to ether.
The tragic fate of the discoverers
The fight to establish who had discovered anaesthesia continued in America and particularly in Paris at the Institut de France. Jackson , a celebrated scientist claimed the discovery of ether in a letter to the Institute without mentioning Morton , a mere dentist. Morton was defended by Velpeau . Meanwhile, Wells who had become an antique dealer, came to France and also claimed the discovery. The documents sent by the various protagonists are preserved in the Institut de France. In 1850 the institute delivered its opinion and awarded the Montyon prize for 1847/48 jointly to Jackson ‘for his observations and experiments on the anaesthetic effects produced by ether and also to Morton for having introduced the technique in practical surgery following the work of Jackson .’
Wells languished in New York, addicted to ether and to chloroform. One evening, while suffering the effects of his addiction he threw vitriol at a prostitute who had injured his friend. After the trial, he committed suicide in his cell by cutting his femoral artery while under the effects of chloroform. There is a statue of Wells in the Place des États-Unis à Paris in the 16e arrondissement.
Morton , who was attacked incessantly by Jackson to prevent him receiving the prize of the US Congress, lived in poverty and died following a stroke. His friends created a magnificent monument to him in the cemetery of Mount Auburn, near Boston.
Jackson , who was addicted to ether and alcohol never recovered from not being recognised as the discoverer of anaesthesia, went mad after seeing the monument to Wells and finished his life in an asylum where he had spent 12 years.