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Chapter VIII

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Chapter X

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CHAPTER IX

MORE CHIVALRY

I am here compelled to enter more into the particulars of one of my cases than I desire, and yet it is necessary because it was the pivot around which revolved many important incidents. It is but a chapter in the history, without which there would be a missing link.

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In July '84 I first went to Tarboro to introduce my Remedy, and after remaining a few days, I had everything in readiness to leave the next morning, but in the afternoon a lady, Miss Pattie McDowell, drove up to the Hotel and said she came for me to go and see Miss Mary Staton, who was almost crazy from the effects of poison oak. I told Miss Pattie I would not like to go to a case of that kind, as it was something I did not recommend my Remedy for. She said Miss Mary Staton wished me to go and see if I could not give her some relief, and had requested her, as her friend, to bring me. She added, ''We do not think she can live the night through, unless something can be done to relieve her."

Again I protested, I did not wish to go, for should she die while I was there, it might do me great harm. Mr. and Mrs. Bryan, and several gentlemen present, heard the conversation and advised me to go. They said the case had been given up by the doctors, who could do nothing for it, and were she to die, it could do me no harm, as everyone was expecting it. So, under protest, I went.

It was a case of great suffering, but I went to work and administered my Remedy and Wash and anxiously awaited the result. I remained with her that night. By morning she was better, and by four o'clock the next evening, the disease was under perfect control. Three days after I went to see her again and found her up and dressed and in the regular prosecution of her household duties.

These facts are verified by a written statement given me for publication, and which I still use in my pamphlet, signed by Miss Mary Staton, Nicholas Staton, Cornelius Staton, Felix Staton, and Miss Pattie McDowell who were all eye-witnesses of my work and its results.

On my second visit to Miss Mary Staton, I told her and the family that it was impossible for an extreme case like that to be

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cured so soon, and as I thought it was liable to break out again at any time, I would not leave Tarboro yet awhile, but would remain a few days, so as to be near when she needed me, and every member of the family expressed themselves as gratified at my decision.

I have never seen anything equal to the enthusiasm that prevailed in Tarboro when the result of my treatment of Miss Mary Staton's case became known. People flocked to see me as if I had been a show, and as for the Remedy, we could not get it there as fast as we needed it.

I had several dozen lots scattered along at the towns on the Wilmington and Weldon Railroad, which I ordered to Tarboro by telegram, and every bottle was sold before I could get it there.

I ordered a Gross from Charlotte, but it was nothing to what the demand called for, and I ordered another.

People would come and pay me the money for it before the Remedy came, to make sure they would get it and not be put off.

Those who were sick wanted it so they might get well.

Those who were well wanted it in case they should get sick.

It seemed that in one day I had become famous. Enthusiasm ran high.

Among the physicians who had attended Miss Mary Staton, there was one little fellow named Baker, who was reported to be considerably annoyed by the result of my work. I was told that ''the boys" had been "guying" him unmercifully and that he had a long face in consequence. I was also told that he was a bosom friend of the Staton boys, but I did not attach much importance to that fact at the time, or realize all that it meant to me.

But, while I was waiting on Miss Mary Staton as I said I would do, she had, as I had predicted, a recurrence of her trouble and, instead of sending for me, they had actually sent for this little Baker, because he had told them that it was not Mrs. Joe Person's Remedy that had done Miss Mary the good, but "the medicine I had given her had just taken effect", and, as incredible as it may seem, it actually turned the tide against me for a while.

People who had spoken for the Remedy came and told me they did not want it. "When I spoke to you for it I thought it was your medicine that 'hoped' Miss Mary Staton, but Dr. Baker says it was his!" Some would add, "And we know him and don't know you".

Several who had paid me wanted their money back, giving the same

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reason. In every instance, I paid it back, until I had refunded $17! and I abided my time.

I am a great believer in Right is Might.

In company with Miss Pattie McDowell--dear Miss Pattie, faithful and good, staunch and true--I went again to see Miss Mary Staton, to see why they should have treated me as they did, after giving me their written testimony as to what my Remedy had done for her.

The Staton boys said the same thing I had heard that Dr. Baker said--it was his medicine that had just taken effect, and not mine that had done the good

Miss Mary said, "I could not help myself, Mrs. Person. You are here today and gone tomorrow. Dr. Baker is here all the time and the boys wanted to send for him, but I know it was your Remedy that did me the good. Then it was that Dr. Baker went on the streets and said the people of Tarboro would let any humbug come along and fool them with his quackery."

I was thoroughly indignant and aroused.

I did not seek Miss Mary Staton's case. I did not even wish to go to it. I went because I couldn't well help myself and as an accommodation to the family. I saw no sense or justice in any doctor hounding me down because I had relieved a suffering woman.

If he could have done it, they would never have sent for me. Could he have relieved her, they would never have thought of sending for me; there would have been no necessity. I was a last resort, after he failed.

Two and two always made four, so, in my righteous indignation I wrote him the following:

Tarboro, N. C. July 18, '84

Dr. J. M. Baker,

I have been informed that you have stigmatized me as a humbug, and my work as quackery. Please let me know whether this is true or not, as I have no desire to do you an injustice, even in my thoughts, unheard.

Respectfully,

Mrs. Joe Person

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The following is his reply:

Tarboro, N. C. July 19 '84

Mrs. Joe Person,

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Dear Madam,

Your note of July 18 was handed me a few minutes ago. In reply I would say I have no desire to injure you in any particular. If there is virtue in your medicine you deserve and will receive the approbation of humanity. A quack is a boastful pretender to medical science or art, of which they know nothing, an irregular, tricking practitioner of physic. A humbug is an imposition, a hoax, a deception. Until you show the medical profession that yourself and your Remedy, neither, can be placed in such a category, we are compelled to look upon you as such and treat you accordingly. I am not one of those persons who think everything out of the legitimate bound of the professional code should be hooted at, but will acknowledge merit wherever found. I assure you, Madam, that whatever I have said or will say in regard to your Remedy or your quackery is meant as no reflection on you personally. I do not now recollect applying the epithets to you, you refer to, but may have done so without any semblance of hypocrisy.

Very truly yours,

Julian M. Baker

Tarboro, N. C. July 19 ‘84

Dr. J. M. Baker,

Dear Sir,

In reply to your favor of this morning, I write for information. Will you be kind enough to tell me in what way I would be allowed to prove to the medical profession that myself and my Remedy, neither, can be placed in such a category as ''quacks'' and "humbugs"?

I send you one of my pamphlets. Read that "Solid Chapter of Solid Facts", and you will see that I did go to the medical profession of Raleigh, and offer to cure free any and all cases of blood impurity they might submit to me as a public test that my Remedy would do all I claimed for it. The privilege was denied me on the ground that "it would be conniving, at the effort to enrich the owner of a patent secret remedy". This presupposed success, as there would be no enrichment to me, had I failed, even in a single case.

Again, I came into your community, had the most extreme case I ever met taken from your hands and placed in mine. I treated the case twenty hours, with such marvelous success that the whole community was stirred, the news spread like wildfire, the feeling amounted to

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enthusiasm, when, seeing your danger, you came to the front and denounced me as a humbug and my work as quackery. Lacking moral courage to come forward, and, for humanity's sake, congratulate me upon having a remedy which could relieve what you proved you could not reach, you did come forward, but it was to make the effort to take from me what you knew belonged to me, and appropriate it to yourself.

If you will not look, how can you see?

You say you are not one who thinks everything out of the legitimate bounds of the professional code should be hooted at, but will acknowledge merit wherever found.

How can you find it if when brought right before you, you close your eyes? If, when the great problem is being worked and the answer is being developed on the tablet of events, you not only ignore the worker, but shielded under a great cloak, get before her and seriously announce to an admiring and applauding public, "I DID THAT"!!

Hoping you can throw some light on a subject which is to me, so far, a mystery, I am

Respectfully,

Mrs. Joe Person

Tarboro, N. C. July 20 '84

Mrs. Joe Person,

Dear Madam,

Your note of yesterday would have been answered sooner, but I have been too busy to attend to it until now.

I do not propose to be the instrument by which you can bring yourself and your remedy into notoriety, and answer your note to remove the delusion from your mind.

You entirely misrepresented the case of Miss Staton and in so doing take occasion to insult me, and, no doubt, as you had a right to do, hold up the petticoat as protection. Be that as it may, I will be candid and just enough, to give you a correct account when you will see the folly of your position and appreciate the ridicule to which you are subjected.

Miss Mary was seen by my father, Dr. J. H. Baker, only one time previous to the attack in which you saw her, the result of his visit, (she being in one of her paroxysms) was to give her immediate relief.

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The next week the trouble returned, he was sent for again, visited her, and made a prescription telling her that relief would be felt as soon as the medicine had time to take effect, making another prescription, which had to be gotten in town. When you saw her, she was under the influence of the medicine he had given in the morning.

You say you relieved her and can have it so if you like, as it signifies nothing, as hundreds of times before had Dr. Speed and others relieved her, and never considered it a matter of any importance whatever. When the trouble returned after you took her in charge, a faithful application of the medicine only aggravated the itching, giving no relief whatever, so that my father was sent for in the night. The result was he gave her instant relief, after your medicine had failed, the same medicine he used then she is using now and every time it is applied.

The lady has been in town since and says the attack which came on after using your medicine was the most violent she ever had in her life. Miss Staton was not seen by my father or myself, until sent for after your remedy failed. Your name was never mentioned by me to Miss Staton or any member of the family, nor have they ever mentioned your name to me but once, and then it was in the spirit of ridicule, in which, Madam, I took no part. If there is any virtue in your medicine, it is certainly not suited to such cases as Miss Staton's.

If it affects others as it did her, I advise you to trade it off for a dog, give him half a dozen bottles, stoppers and all and if that don't kill him, shoot him. I have devoted as much time to you and your remedy as I intend to; my time is too valuable for such recreation, so do not write me any more love letters.

Respectfully,

Julian M. Baker

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Instinctively I acted:

I got ½ dozen bottles of the now famous Remedy, put them on a waiter, and spread a napkin over it.

Instinctively I wrote:

Dr. Baker,

In compliance with your prescription, I send you a half dozen bottles of my Remedy. Please take it, stoppers and all, and if it don't kill you, let me know and I will come over and shoot you.

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Very truly,

Mrs. Joe Person.

N. B. This is not intended as a love letter.

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After impulse came reflection, and I saw that I could not afford to reply to such a missive, and did not reply.

Why give a letter I never sent? Because I am dealing with FACTS and giving them as they actually occurred.

I knew he was unjust and un-christian, but I did not know he was dirty, and I truly regretted that I had dignified him by notice, or put myself in touch with a man of his calibre, but I was a stranger then to Tarboro and Tarboro ways.

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Circumstances again forced me to the front and to explain so, I published a Card in the Southerner, explanatory of the situation and left it to the Public to decide how unjust it was for them to take Miss Mary Staton's case from me and give it to Dr. Baker, when their published statement, signed by every, member of the family and by Miss Mary, would show what my Remedy had done for her, and the absurdity of his claim, and again the Public was with me and knew I was right, and again the demand for my Remedy was started and continued on a solid basis.

This is evidenced by the following letter, which showed the stand my Remedy had taken in Tarboro seven months after the Staton case, regardless.

Tarboro, N. C. Feb. 4, 1885

Mrs. Joe. Person, Madam,

Ship at once five gross of your Remedy and two gross of your Wash. We are doing well with it in Tarboro, and sales are rapidly increasing. It has given satisfaction, so far as we have learned, in every case.

Respectfully,

E. B. Hodges & Co.

And this order for five gross was duplicated in less than sixty days.

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