My Genealogy Hound

CHARLES LEONIDAS CARTER, M. D., is one of the influential citizens of Warrensburg, and been retired from practice, except office and consultation practice, for the past four years on account of poor health. From time to time in his career he has contributed notable and brilliant articles on medical science, and on literary and scientific subjects. For some four years he was a regular contributor to the “Phrenological Journal,” published in New York. He has also written for the “Free-thinkers’ Magazine,” of Chicago, and for a year was editor of the St. Louis Clinical Record. The last-named position was held while he was living at Holden, Mo., and on account of the inconvenience occasioned thereby he found it best to resign. In 1866 he wrote a work on pathology, which has received general commendation from the medical fraternity and is now in its second edition. It has been much used as a textbook, and is remarkable for its clearness, conciseness and beauty of language.

Dr. Carter was born at Smith’s Crossroads (now Dayton), Tenn., March 1, 1832, and is a son of William and Ruth (McFarland) Carter. His grandfather, James Carter, was of English ancestry and a native of Virginia. Mrs. Ruth Carter was of Scotch origin, her birth having occurred in Scotland in 1808, and with her parents she came to America in girlhood. She was a relative of the Calhoun family, which is noted in the history of this country. Her early years were passed in Abbeville, S. C., and later she moved to Tennessee, where she was married at the age of eighteen years. William Carter bought and sold horses and mules extensively, and though his father had formerly been in very affluent circumstances his estate went to pay security debts, and thus he was obliged to start anew. William Carter moved to Bradley County, Tenn., where he was elected Sheriff, and where he died soon afterward, in the fall of 1836. One of his deputies was appointed administrator of the estate and appropriated everything he could lay his hands on. On account of the circumstances just mentioned. Dr. Carter and other members of the family were left comparatively destitute. When he was in his nineteenth year he moved to Cass County, Mo., there obtaining a position as assistant to the County Assessor. From the time he was nine years of age he had been obliged to earn whatever he could, and thus did not have much opportunity to gain an education. He was a natural student and always took his books with him wherever he went, in order to employ his spare moments. For three years he taught school at Pleasant Hill and then for two years more was thus engaged in other places. He was but fourteen years of age when he formed a resolution to become a physician, and studied medical works with that end in view. In 1857 he entered the St. Louis Medical College, and after passing a successful examination began practicing at Pleasant Hill. In 1859 he moved to Holden, a town which had just been laid out, and in 1862 received a diploma for post-graduate work at the St. Louis Medical College. In April, 1863, he was made Assistant Surgeon of the Sixth Missouri State Militia, after passing the army examination twenty-four points higher than the regulation required. In nine months he was promoted and put in charge of Branch B of Clay General Hospital at Louisville, Ky., and a short time afterwards was called to the front and put in charge of the sick and wounded of the Seventeenth Army Corps at Marietta, Ga. When Atlanta fell he went there, his services being in great demand, and finally, in November, 1864, he resigned on account of failing health, and returned to Holden. October 4, 1863, while with the cavalry at Neosho, Mo., he was captured and held until the next morning, in the mean while treating the enemy’s wounded men.

From 1867 until 1888 the Doctor practiced uninterruptedly at Holden, when, in order to have a much needed rest, he went to El Dorado Springs. While there he was placed on the Board of Pension Examiners and officiated as such during the three years of his stay at that point. He was married, February 24, 1875, to Virginia Haynes, of Holden. The latter was born in this county in February, 1853, and is a daughter of James and Anna Haynes, of Tennessee, descendants of old Carolina families. The Doctor’s only son, Charles, was born in Holden May 7, 1876, and the daughter, Cora Lee, a native of the same place, was born September 27, 1877.

Reared in the faith of the Democracy, Dr. Carter cast his first ballot for Franklin Pierce, and though a strong Union man during the war adhered to the Democracy until 1876, since which time he has been a Republican. He has never been desirous of public office, but in 1882 was nominated for the Legislature. Although he had no expectation of being elected, he cut down a usual majority of four hundred to one hundred and eighty-three votes. Socially he belongs to the Knights of Pythias, the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and is a Mason of the Knight-Templar degree. Religiously he is a Free-thinker, being notably honorable, truthful and temperate, and is devoted to home, humanity and science.