The endowment of torture : revelations from the Rockefeller Hell, New York, 1909 : three affidavits / from employees at the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research, New York, U.S.A., made Dec. 3rd, 1909.
- Kennedy, Mary L.
- Date:
- 1909
Licence: In copyright
Credit: The endowment of torture : revelations from the Rockefeller Hell, New York, 1909 : three affidavits / from employees at the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research, New York, U.S.A., made Dec. 3rd, 1909. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.
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![grafted leg and to look at the poor animal suffer was awful. Oh, to look at it was something terrible! Miss Lilly said that she thought it was strange that some people could’nt stand these things. The leg and ear grafting was awful. The dogs began to swell up about three hours after the leg operation. The swelling always started at the paws and went all the way up. Dr. Carrel would press and push his finger into the wounds; he would come in from the street and not wash his hands and not use any antiseptic, but go right over to the dog. Miss Lilly said that Dr. Carrel would never have a success if he did not clean up before going over to the dogs. Emil said it was all a bluff. Dr. Carrel always used aluminum tubes to connect the bones. He hammered one end of the tube into the bone of the leg to be attached and then worked the other end into the marrow of the bone of the live dog and joined them. The plaster casts would become hardened and rub against the flesh on the inside of the bend of the leg, causing it to fester and become very sore. The skin on the grafted leg of the dog would become dry, so I suggested that it would be a good idea to rub the leg with vaseline or olive oil. Dr. Carrel said that he intended to do it later. Dr. Carrel kept the dogs till he couldn’t keep them any longer. He gave up the ear dogs quicker. The leg dogs wasted away to nothing, you know . . . The leg dogs were very peevish while strapped to the canvas for such a long time, and Dr. Carrel took stiff white rubber tubing to whip and beat these dogs for not lying still and quiet. It was awful hard rubber tubing, white and stiff; it is not like the soft black rubber tubing. It was about seven-eighths of an inch in diameter besides being very thick and'heavy and stiff. For a week or two after the “ Herald ” made so much talk about the Institute they had an experienced man to look after the dogs at night to keep them still, and their way of keeping them still was to whip them. “Tom’’Horton, the man who cleans the kennels and cooks the food and who is the only one there who was kind to the animals, suggested that the dogs should be allowed to take some exercise to improve their circulation. Dr. Carrel said this was a good idea, so Emil took the dogs for exercise ; but of course the dogs’ legs were so weak and in such bad condition that they could not walk, and Emil would handle them roughly and slam them down and hit them with his fist. I asked Emil why he was so cruel with the dogs, and he said—“ Oh, its only a big bluff here, any- way ; he will never, never have a success anyway.” * * * The wounds looked terrible after operations. They would mortify and smell terribly. The dogs swelled away up to the abdomen, and they would moan and howl. No anaesthetic was ever given after the first operation. Dr. Carrel, after the dogs are dead, takes them down to his room and cuts them up. Chest Operations under Anaesthesia. Emil puts a medium sized dog under the anaesthetic. Dr. Carrel takes a tube which had been pushed through a hole in a block of wood and puts this tube down the trachea; the block of wood catches across the jaws and holds the mouth wide open ; then the dog’s jaws are tied tight around and down on the wood so it cannot slip. Dr. Carrell cuts the dogs either like this [indicating semi-circle on chest] or straight across. He does different things when the chest is open. Sometimes he puts his hand in and lifts up the lungs and pushes and fusses around; sometimes he cuts a very delicate artery with the scissors and ties it with silk ; then the artery breaks and blood spurts out and the dogs die from haemorrhage; the blood spurts all over everything, even the walls and everywhere and all over us. Miss Lilley says :—“ He will never be able to do anything with that; it is too delicate a place to cut.” The dogs would sometimes die right on the table ; blood would spurt up, covering everything, and Dr. Carrel’s glasses would become full of blood and I had to clean them. Two or three days after a chest operation, if the dog had’nt died on the table, Dr. Carrel brings in the dog and takes off the dressing. Then he squeezes the wounds very I hard and presses on them ; a sort of fluid looking like blood comes out; the dog always moans and howls and tries to get away. No anaesthetic. In some chest operations he makes the cut horizontally across the chest down to the bone. Then, with the big bone cutting scissors or pliers, he would cut the ribs right in two. After this he uses the retractor, which is a strong steel instrument with claws, and fastens the claws into each side of the wound where he had cut the ribs. By this instrument he would draw open the wound, bones and all, like this (indicating an opening five or six inches in width) until he showed the dog’s heart and lungs. Miss Lilly would adjust and tighten the screws of the retractor to hold it in its position; then Dr. Carrel would put his whole hand in and go to work in there The dogs suffered terribly and would moan and howl and cry. About an hour or less after this operation the dog’s legs would sometimes become stiff and rigid. Monday, November 15th, 1909, a dog was being operated upon, and I was told to put my head under the sheet and stuff cotton down the dog’s throat. I had to untie the fastenings around the dog’s mouth to put the cotton in so that the dog should not get too much air. Emil worked a bellows forcing some sort of air or gas into the dog, and Dr. Carrel thought the dog was getting loo much outside air instead of out of the bellows. I did not put the cotton into the dog’s throat, but put it just inside the dog’s mouth, because I was afraid the dog would choke and die if I forced so much cotton down into his throat. Dr. Carrel insisted that I should put the cotton as far as I could down the throat, and I did so. The dog afterward died, and Miss Lilly cut it up and took out everything above the diaphram. Sometimes if Emil was pumping too much air into the dog the lung would come right out of the body. The first time that Dr. Carrel used this bellows was at Dr. Meltzer’s suggestion. Dr. Meltzer’s apparatus was used, but our dog died. When Dr. Meltzer used his apparatus there was no breathing, but only the beating of the heart, and that was the only way you knew that the animal was alive—by the beating of the heart. While using the bellows Dr. Carrel exclaimed, “Oh, he is breath- ing ! and Dr. Meltzer said, “ That’s all right; just watch the heart beat. That’s all that’s necessary.” Then Dr: Carrel said, “ Oh, he’s blue,” referring to the gums and the inside of the lips. Dr. Meltzer said, “ That’s all right; that’s all right. That makes no difference.” And then the dog died right off. Miss Lilly would often say to Dr. Carrel:—“ What are you going to do with this dog this morning ? ” And Dr. Carrel would say: “ I don’t know. I’ll see after I get started.” Dr. Carrel did two dogs that morning, and almost always did two or three dogs or cats of a morning on an operation •—that is, except the leg operation ; that took from ten o’clock until one o’clock. Transplantation under Anaesthesia. Lincoln’s birthday, February I2th, 1909, two beautiful large Newfoundland dogs, which must have been some- body’s pets and very valuable, were brought in to have the operation of transplantation of kidneys performed. The first dog was opened and the kidneys cut out. Miss Lilley was left to take care of and tie up the arteries. She let an artery slip and the dog bled to death. Emil was told to give the anaesthetic to the second dog, but gave it too much ether and it died. Dr. Carrel got in a terrible rage and stormed about, gritting his teeth, etc. Miss Lilly said she had to pacify him. Another large dog which he thought had had a successful operation was brought back from the farm in New Jersey, but when the dog was opened it was so terribly decayed inside that Dr. Carrel ordered it to be chloroformed immediately. The minute Dr. Carrel made the incision he ran away from the dog and said “ Chloroform it imme- diately.” The blood inside was black and the flesh was black and all rotten inside. Oh, the odour was terrible. Dr. Carrel opens dogs and cuts pieces out of their](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b22288673_0008.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
