My Genealogy Hound

Robert W. Barton, M.D., considered among the profession as one of the leading physicans, and an upright and honest citizen of Crittenden County, was born in this county, March 17, 1860, to the union of James F. and Frances (Edmonds) Barton. [See sketch.] Robert W. Barton spent most of his youth in Memphis, Tenn., and was educated in the common schools of Louisville, Ky., and the Lincoln public school of St. Louis, Mo. In 1876, during the big strike in St. Louis, he volunteered as a soldier and served throughout that affray in that city, the youngest of 3,000 volunteers, and did active and honorable service for eleven days while quelling the riot. He was requested and urged by his officers to become a West Point cadet at large from Missouri, but owing to the fact that he was a son of a Confederate soldier he could not be appointed, although endorsed by Capt. Elerby, Lieut. Barlow and other officers, and quite a number of prominent men of both Nashville and Memphis, Tenn. In 1879 he entered the State University of Tennessee, and owing to his ill health remained for only two years, and commenced the study of medicine in Memphis with Dr. Rogers as his preceptor, in 1882, and later he assisted R. D. Murray, United States army surgeon for four months. In 1883, he was appointed interne in the city hospital of Physicians and Surgeons of Baltimore, Md., from which school he graduated in 1884, and returned to Memphis, Tenn., where he commenced the practice of his profession. In July of that year he came to this county, where he has since practiced. While in Memphis he was a member of the State Medical Association of Tennessee, and is now of the Tri-State Medical Society of Mississippi, Arkansas and Tennessee, and president of the board of medical examiners of this county. Dr. Barton was married to Miss Mamie G. Grasty, who was born in Danville, Va., and was reared in Baltimore, Md., where she graduated from the Western Female High School, taking the Peabody medal. She then graduated from the Maryland Musical Institute, under Prof. May. Mrs. Barton is a very highly educated lady and is in every way an estimable woman. She is the mother of two children: Phebe Housen and Francis Edmunds. She is an active and prominent member of the Second Presbyterian Church of Memphis, Tenn.