The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1898-01-06
is THERE NO VITAL SPOT?
WOUNDS OF HEART AND BRAIN
THAT HAVE FAILED TO KILL.
Living Five Months with a Bullet
Embedded ia His Heart-A Needle
Removed From the Heart by Surg
cry RecOveries From Brain


Embedded ia His Heart-A Needle
Removed From the Heart by Surg
cry RecOveries From Brain
Wounds.
From the Chicago Tribune.
For my own part" said the doctor,
with shrug, Il would prefer not to be
shot at ALL whether in the heart, head,
lungs liver or brain, and yet have taken
note of many cases recently in which per-
sons have sustained gunshot wounds of
supposedly fatal character, who are still
alive and going about their business
The doctor and his companion were
passing a downtown museum when the
conversation took this turn. Among the
freaks pictured and caricatured in front
of the building was a man with a ragged
bullet wound torn through his heart
which organ was WILDLY exposed in the
flarlng daub-whle the angel of death
was lowering over him, ready to snatch
him away at any moment. The appeal
to morbid amusement seekers was such
as to lead to the inference that the I'M
fortunate with the wound in his heart
might obligngly drop dead at any min
ute, for the special delectation of those
who paid their dimes and walked in to
see him.
"Then," said the doctors friend, "a shot
or a stab in the heart is not necessarily
fatal, as it is understood by modern sur
gery?"
mot at ALL" returned the doctor. But,
of course, we are not speaking of wounds
as big and terrible as the one in that mu-
scum picture; that is apparently even
worse than the thrust received by Mercu-
tio-looks about as deep as. we'll and
as wide as a church door. No man who
has been wounded like that ever survives
more than minute.
THAT man in the museum is alleged to
be Charles B. Nelson, who was mysterious
y shot one evening last summer while
in the company of Mrs. Edith Marguerite
Staples In Washington Park The shoot
ing occurred on the night of July !, five
months ago, and the man with an ounce
of lead in his heart is still alive. Wheth-
er he sleeps we'll and has a good appetite
1 am unable to say. He was formerly
cyclist of some note. Nelson's breast was
subjected to the x-rays, and, according to
sciographs, which were made at the time,
the bullet uolged in the septum of the
heart-the fourfold partition of muscular
of that organ into right and
left auricles and Ventricles. There
it has continued to throb up and
down about 100000 times a day ever since
that mysterious shooting and at every pull
sation refuting the old theory of medical
science that the touch of hostile metal TO
mans heart brings death.
THE most skillful and daring surgeon on
earth, if he were asked to remove the bull
let from Nelson's heart would shake ms
head in the negative. So this man must
carry his leaden handicap as long as life
shall last. Seems strange, doesn't IT, In
the sciograph views which were made OF
Nelson's wound the shadow of the bullet
appears almost exactly in the center OF
the thorax. midway between the ends OF
the fourth pair of ribs. In the profile view
of the thorax the location of the black
spot shows that the bullet penetrated two
and a half inches of cartilage and muscle
before it was stopped. AT this point Wnere
it entered the thoraX the pericardium,
which encloses the heart, touches the ster-
num- itself less than an inch in thickness;
so that surgeons claim the other inch and
a half of the bullets path was ploughed
through the fibers of the heart The OK
act injury indicted upon the heart, now
ever is still an open question, when VIII
only be determined satisfactorily to sci
ence by an autopsy. 1t has been argued
bv some that the bullet was spent ball,
which pierced the pericardium and drop
ped in which case the muscular tissues OF
the heart were not lacerated or wounded.
and yet, Notwithstanding what l have
said we have surgeons nowadays who do
undertake and carry to successful con-
clusion operations on the heart. This IS
done by opening the pericardium, for eX-
ample. in cases of dropsy of the heart, and
drawing off the fluid by aspiration. A man
may have his heart punctured with the
point of a knife or a needle and still re-
cover from the injury. 1t used to be held
that wounds of this character were invari-
ably fatal. But wound of the heart Is
not necessarily fatal as is shown i'm the
case where a needle was removed by Cal
lender from the substance of that organ.
Cases of like nature have been reported by
Drs. Hahn, Agnew, Steiner and Others.
More than fifty cases where rupture OF
the heart walls did not result in immedi-
ate death are reported by DIR. d. j. Ham,
ilton, a well-known Scotch surgeon and
pathologist.
1.-The case of Poole, a prize fighter, was
one of the most remarkable. Poole was
shot In the heart while engaged in an en-
counter with a man named Baker in New
Jersey in 1855 To all outward appearance
he recovered rapidly, and in four days felt
so well that he expressed a wish to finish
the interrupted contest. Twelve days
later however he suddenly dropped to the
ground Within five minutes ne was deaI.
More remarkable sill, perhaps, are the
numerous injuries TO the brain and SPINAL
cord. which on first view would be pro-
nounced fatal and yet from which the
wounded persons recover. AT Valparaiso,
Ind a few days ago, a man named Her
bert j. Fish, while in a fit of temporary
insanity, put 3S-callber bullet through
his brain, and at last accounts he was still
alive and apparently getting well. The
bullet by all accounts, passed through the
right and left anterior hemispheres of the
brain, lodging finally in the posterior bone
wall of the left eye socket. In its course
the ball destroyed large amount of brain
matter. AT the same time it cut the optic
nerves of both eyes, destroying the sight.
In some way the sense Of smell, too, was
destroyed 1t seems miraculous that this
man should recover and retain any of his
senses, but the physicians in attendance
reported that aside from the fact of
somewhat weakened mental apparatus he
appeared to be about as rational as before
he sustained the self-inflicted wound. The