FIRST AFRICAN AMERICAN DOCTORS

During the early Colonial Period in English North America, there were virtually no apprentice or institutionally trained physicians. The single recorded exception seems to be Lucas Santomee, a Dutch-trained physician who practiced in New Amsterdam during the 1660s. Santomee was successful and a property owner. In 1644, he was issued a Dutch land grant in New Netherland that included property in what eventually became Brooklyn and Greenwich Village. Santomee was the son of Peter Santomee, one of the first eleven Africans brought to the area. Lucas, a free black, became a well-known physician in the area.

There were many African medical practitioners. This can be viewed as a continuation of ancient African medical traditions and was the healing method with which slaves were most comfortable. These healers could be described as slave midwives, root doctors, spirit healers, conjurers, or “kitchen physicks.” They were hands-on medical work force that staffed the slave health subsystem and provided the medical care and attention most Black received during the Colonial Period until the Civil war.

Adapted from Black Saga: The African American Experience by Charles M. Christian and An American Heath Dilemma: A Medical History of African Americans and The Problem of Race by W. Michael Byrd and Linda A. Clayton.