BIO: Benjamin Rush SENSENY, M.D., Chambersburg, Franklin County, PA

Contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by Abby Bowman

Copyright 2006.  All rights reserved.
http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm
http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/franklin/
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Medical Men of Franklin County, 1750-1925 by Ambrose Watts Thrush, M.D.;
Chambersburg, Pa.; Medical Society of Franklin County, Page 93-94 
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BENJAMIN RUSH SENSENY, M.D.

1843 – 1880

Dr. B. R. Senseny was born 1843 in Chambersburg, a son of Dr. Abraham H. and 
Jane K. (Davis) Senseny.  He received a liberal education and began the study of 
medicine with his father.

In 1863, when twenty years of age, he presented himself before a Board of Army 
Surgeons in Philadelphia, Pa., and having passed a satisfactory examination, he 
was accepted and assigned to Cherry Hill Hospital, Philadelphia, Pa.  After a 
short time here, he was transferred to Jefferson Barracks, Missouri.  While in 
the service there, he attended lectures at Pope Medical College, St. Louis, Mo., 
and received his degree M. D. 1864 from this institution.  After graduation he 
was transferred to a hospital in Chambersburg and so remained until the end of 
the war.

At the close of the War of the Rebellion he began the practice of medicine in 
Chambersburg and very soon enjoyed a large and lucrative practice which he held 
until the time of his death in 1880.

The first vaccine virus farm ever established in the United States was that of 
the late Dr. B. Rush Senseny in this place.  His stables and operating rooms 
were on the alley to the rear of Lincoln Way East, two doors west of the present 
Chamber of Commerce.  The virus was brought from Bogency farm in France.  Dr. 
Senseny supplied our army and navy with virus.  Others started afterwards here 
and in Boston, but Dr. Senseny was the originator in this country.

Dr. Senseny was a member of the Medical Society from 1876.  He married 1865 
Rosalie J. Murdock of St. Louis, Missouri.  He is buried in the Falling Spring 
Churchyard.