Dominique-Jean Larrey
(1766 - 1842)

Napoleonic Surgeon-in-Chief Dominique-Jean Larrey is described in Napoleon's last testament as "the worthiest man I ever met". In a career spanning several blood-stained decades, Larrey carried out thousands of battlefield amputations with great speed and all possible humanity. In 1793, Larrey established the ambulance volante (flying ambulance), a corps of surgeons and nurses who accompanied armies into battle and tended their soldiers' wounds. This was an era before the Red Cross or antisepsis; mortality rates were high.

Larrey was a patriotic but compassionate Frenchman. He was perhaps the only figure who appreciated the potential significance of Henry Hill Hickman's work on "suspended animation".