Role Surgeon | Resting place Easton Name Christopher Cox | |
Governor Augustus BradfordThomas Swann Died November 25, 1882, Washington, D.C., United States | ||
Preceded by None – office created Political party National Union Party | ||
Christopher Christian Cox (August 28, 1816 – November 25, 1882) was known as an American surgeon, professor at Philadelphia College of Medicine and served briefly as a politician.
Biography
Born in Baltimore, Cox was a member of the National Union Party, a coalition of Democrats loyal to the Union and Republicans during the Civil War. He received a Bachelor of Arts from Yale in 1835 and a Master of Arts thereafter. He graduated from Washington University with a Doctor of Medicine degree in 1838 and began practicing in Baltimore. He moved to practice in Easton in 1843.
He was Professor of Medical Jurisprudence at the Philadelphia College of Medicine from 1848 to 1849 and became Professor of Obstetrics and Diseases of Women and Children in 1849. In 1857 and 1857 Cox was president of the Medical and Chirurgical Faculty of Maryland. In 1861 he became a surgeon in the United States Army, leaving in 1862.
Cox served as the first Lieutenant Governor of Maryland from 1865 to 1868. The relatively new office was abolished in 1868 and not reinstated until 1970, upon which the next lieutenant governor, Blair Lee III, was elected. Re-creation of the office involved an amendment to the Maryland Constitution of 1867, which had superseded the 1864 constitution under which the office was initially established.
Trinity College conferred an LL. D. on Cox in 1867, and in 1869 became Professor of Medical Jurisprudence at Georgetown University. He was editor of the National Medical Journal in Washington, D.C. from 1870 to 1872, and also assistant editor of the Baltimore Patriot.
Cox was one of the founders of the Literary Society of Washington in 1874. An Episcopalian, he died in Washington D.C.