Robert King Stone
Quick Facts
Biography
Robert King Stone (December 11, 1822 – April 23, 1872) was a 19th-century professor at Columbian College Medical School (predecessor to today's George Washington University School of Medicine) and was considered "the dean of the Washington medical community". Stone served U.S. President Abraham Lincoln during the years of the American Civil War and was present at Lincoln's deathbed and at his autopsy in 1865.
The son of engraver William J. Stone, Robert King Stone was born in Washington, D.C. He received his medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1845 and visited major hospitals of London, Paris and Vienna before starting his own medical practice in the United States in 1847. At the time of his death, from apoplexy, he was one of the most prominent physicians in Washington, D.C. He was survived by his wife, Elizabeth J. Stone, who died in 1892.
A collection of his papers is held at the National Library of Medicine in Bethesda, Maryland.