Introduction
DR. WESLEY JOHNSON BARRETT was born in Guthriesville, Pennsylvania on May 20, 1874. He graduated from the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy and Science in 1896, and from Hahneman Medical College in Philadelphia in 1901. He first turns up in Camden City Directories in 1897, working as a drug clerk and living at 217 South 6th Street. The 1898 Directory has him living at 601 Berkley Street.
Dr. Barrett appears in City Directories from 1902 to 1907 at 442 Broadway. From 1908 through the fall of 1918 his home and office was at 510 Broadway. Shortly before the 1920 Census he moved to 606 Cooper Street, where he kept his home and office through 1924. By the time the 1926 City Directory was compiled, Dr. Barrett had moved to 217 Wayne Avenue in Haddonfield, New Jersey. He kept his medical office in Camden, at 517 Cooper Street.
Dr. Barrett’s primary concern was surgery. His career took him to the position of Chief of Surgery at West Jersey Hospital. Dr. Barrett was a member of the Camden County Medical Society, Camden City Medical Society, American Medical Association, West Jersey Medical Society, and the Homeopathic Society of New Jersey. He was also Fellow of the American College of Surgeons. Dr. Barrett was president of the Camden County Medical Society in 1930.
Dr. Barrett was also involved with the Camden Copper Works, originally on South 5th Street, at Washington Street, and later at 559–609 South Second Street. The business was incorporated under the laws of New Jersey in 1912 for $50,000 fully paid, with Bernard Ahlberg, the founder, as president and manager; Dr. Wesley J. Barrett, secretary, and Walter E. Ahlberg, the founder’s son, as treasurer. These also constituted the board of directors.
Dr. Barrett was married to Sarah M. Steedle. They had three daughters, Frances, Grace, and Ruth. Dr. Barrett passed away in 1934. Mrs. Barrett was still living at the Haddonfield address as late as 1947.
WWI Draft Registration Card: Dr. Wesley J. Barrett
Camden Courier-Post —
WWI Draft Registration Card: Dr. Wesley J. Barrett
[WWI Draft Registration Card for Wesley Johnson Barrett, physician, 510 Broadway, Camden, N.J., born May 20th, 1874. Local Board for Division No. 2, City of Camden, State of New Jersey, Board of Education, Room #12, City Hall, Camden, New Jersey.]
Enos B. Dellmuth Dies from Stroke
Camden Courier-Post —
Death Ascribed to Devotion to Duty as Grand Jury Foreman
Enos B. Dellmuth, 43, prominent civic leader and foreman of the June term of Camden county grand jury, died at his home, 426 Chambers street, yesterday following a stroke at the close of the jury’s last session on Friday.
Dellmuth died a martyr to his duty, according to the members of his family and his friends. He had not been feeling well for about five weeks, but continued to attend the grand jury sessions every Tuesday. Finally his condition became such that he could not attend the regular session last Tuesday.
He was staying at his summer home in Seaside Heights last Friday when he was notified that the grand jury would meet that afternoon to make its final presentment to Judge Samuel M. Shay. As the foreman must sign all true bills and recommendations, Dellmuth motored to this city. While he was driving he suffered a slight stroke, but he continued to the courthouse.
Some premonition of serious illness and possibly death must have come to him during the meeting, for while the grand jurors discussed a resolution calling upon the board of freeholders to appropriate more money for a Camden charitable institution one of the jurors, who knew that Dellmuth was a candidate for freeholder from the Ninth, remarked,
“I guess that will be taken care of when Mr. Dellmuth gets on the freeholder board.”
“I don’t know about that,” Dellmuth was heard to mutter.
A few minutes after the jury had been officially dismissed by Judge Shay, the foreman complained of severe pains in the head, and he was accompanied to his home by fellow jurors. His condition rapidly grew worse, and Dr. Wesley Barrett diagnosed his ailment as cerebral hemorrhage. Dr. Elliott Schull and two specialists confirmed the diagnosis.
Dellmuth would have been 44 on October 24. According to members of his family, he always dreaded his forty-fourth birthday, as his father and a sister had died in their forty-fourth years.
The deceased served four years as councilman from the Ninth ward, and was the Republican candidate for freeholder at the coming general election. He was a former president of the Ninth Ward Republican Club and at the time of his death was vice-president. He was a member of Excelsior Consistory, Trimble Lodge, No. 117, F. & A. M.; Camden Shrine Club; A. A. O. N. M. S., of Trenton; The Seven O’Clock Club of Philadelphia; Camden Elks, Camden Rotary Club and other civic associations.
He was manager of the eastern division of the C. Howard Hunt Pen Company, Camden.
The deceased is survived by his wife, Florence D.; his sister, Mrs. A. Dellmuth Hauser, of Camden; a son, Carl, former Camden High School three-letter athlete and now a student at Swarthmore College, and four daughters, Ethel, Dorothy, Marian and Mary.
The members of the grand jury will convene tomorrow evening and go to the Dellmuth residence to pay their last respects. The members of the Ninth Ward Republican Club, of which Edward Holloway is president, will meet 8 p.m. tomorrow at [?] Broadway and then visit the home of the late vice-president.
Funeral services will be held at 2 p.m. Wednesday at his late residence. Masonic and Elk services will also be held. Interment will be in Harleigh Cemetery.
Dr. W.J. Barrett Speaks at Capital Convention
Camden Courier-Post —
Washington, June 14.—Dr. Wesley J. Barrett, of Camden, N. J., today addressed the national convention of the American Institute of Homeopathy, meeting for its 88th session here.
Dr. Barrett, who for some years has taken a prominent part in national homeopathic affairs, read a scientific paper entitled "A Resume of One Hundred Cases of Appendicitis" before the Surgical and Gynecological Society, in which he surveyed new homeopathic developments in this field.
Also on the program at the convention is Dr. Joel T. Boone, White House physician to both President Hoover and former President Coolidge, and one of the country's leading homeopathic physicians.