Jones, Samuel Arthur (1834-1912) | Rare Book & Manuscript Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Samuel Arthur Jones was born in Manchester, England, on June 11, 1834, to Margaret Edwards and John Edwin Jones. Of Welsh heritage, the Joneses immigrated to the United States in 1842.

In 1860, Jones received his M.D. from the Homeopathic Medical College of Missouri and in 1861, from the Homeopathic Medical College of Pennsylvania. He served as Assistant Surgeon in the Union Army during the American Civil War, first for the 22nd New Jersey Infantry (1862-1863), and later for the 22nd Regiment of the New York National Guard.

Jones  was appointed Professor of Histology at the New York Homeopathic Medical College in 1870, at which time he also served on the first New York Board of Medical Examiners (1872). In 1875, Jones helped to organize the Homeopathic Medical College at the University of Michigan, serving as Dean and Professor of Materia Medica and Therapeutics until 1880, when he resigned to practice medicine in Ann Arbor, MI.

In addition to his medical career, Jones also pursued a passion for 19th century literature and book collecting, with particular interest in those by Henry David Thoreau and Thomas Carlyle.

Jones married Maria Van Brunt (1845-1937) on November 26, 1863; the couple shared eleven children. He died on March 9, 1912 and is buried in Forest Hill Cemetery.