Pauline Hill19101919, 20s, chicago, illinois, illegaldoctorDr. George FosbergOn December 4, 1916, 23-year-old Pauline Hill died at Chicago’s Post Graduate Hospital from complications of an abortion. She made a deathbed statement that Dr. George E. Fosberg had perpetrated the abortion at his office on November 27.

Pauline, who had been married about a year, had confessed the abortion to her husband before implicating Fosberg.

Even though Fosberg had a history of abortion allegations, including admitting to having perpetrated a fatal abortion on Bessie Orme in 1906, the case regarding Pauline’s death never went to trial. Fosberg was sent to prison for bank fraud and lost his license. Upon his release, he opened a boarding home where he perpetrated a fatal abortion on Geraldine Schuyler in 1944.

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Note, please, that with overall public health issues such as doctors not using proper aseptic techniques, lack of access to blood transfusions and antibiotics, and overall poor health to begin with, there was likely little difference between the performance of a legal abortion and illegal practice, and the aftercare for either type of abortion was probably equally unlikely to do the woman much, if any, good.

In fact, due to improvements in addressing these problems, maternal mortality in general (and abortion mortality with it) fell dramatically in the 20th Century, decades before Roe vs. Wade legalized abortion across America.

For more information about early 20th Century abortion mortality, see Abortion Deaths 1910-1919.

For more on pre-legalization abortion, see The Bad Old Days of Abortion

Sources:

• Homicide in Chicago Interactive Database
• “Dr. Foxberg Arrested on Deathbed Charge,” Chicago Daily Tribune, Dec. 5, 1916
• news brief entry, Chicago Day Book, Jan. 13, 1917
• “Doctor is Held for Inquest,” Chicago Day Book, Dec. 4, 1916

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