Information Sheet

 

 

R         Andersen, Hans Peter.

832                  Papers, 1909-1920.

                                    Eight folders.

 

 

 

These are papers of Dr. Hans Peter Andersen, a physician associated with Washington Uni­versity Medical School in St. Louis.  Most of the collection consists of correspondence (in Danish) from Andersen’s family in Denmark.  There is also a folder of letters from friends in the U. S. Army Medical Corps in France during World War One.

 

Little is known of Andersen’s personal history.  His papers include a certificate (8 August 1914) that he studied bacteriology at University of Copenhagen in 1903.  The earliest letters (1909) are addressed to Andersen at the “Barnum & Bailey Cookhouse” forwarded to him at Min­neapolis, Minnesota, Los Angeles, California, Seattle, Washington, and Dallas and Temple, Texas.  In 1910-1914, Andersen lived in Chickasha, Oklahoma, and Arkansas City, Kansas.  In 1914-1917, Andersen was at Washington University Medical School, apparently working in the labora­tory.  By 1919, he was associated with Barnes Hospital.  Later, Andersen practiced in St. Marys and Bloomsdale, Missouri.

 

Most of the Andersen collection (folders 1-6) consists of family correspondence in Danish.  Andersen’s mother, father, and brother wrote regularly from Horsholm, Taastrup, Copenhagen, and Frederickshaven, Denmark.  Their regular letters to the United States were uninterrupted by World War One, but the letters during 1918 are marked as having been examined by a censor.

 

Folder 7 includes letters (in English) from medical colleagues serving with the U. S. Army during World War One.  Most are from Bert C. Ball, a medical student at Washington University and ward orderly at Base Hospital No. 21 in France.  Ball wrote of mutual friends, army life, and his medical duties.  His letter of 29 November 1918 notes the Thanksgiving celebration at the hos­pital, influenza cases, and hope for a permanent armistice.  There is also a letter (28 August 1917) from Dr. E. L. Opie, former medical school dean, who operated an army medical laboratory in France.  The correspondence includes wartime photographs of Capt. Walter S. Thomas and Capt. E. L. Opie.

 

Folder 8 contains “Anatomical Diagnoses,” containing the results of over one hundred au­topsies, 1917-1918, performed by Andersen and other physicians.  The typewritten summaries in­clude primary and subsidiary causes of death.

 

  

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