Dr. Bell was born in New Hampshire into a distinguished family where his father served as Chief Justice, Governor, and Senator of that state. Educated at Bowdoin College, he received his medical degree from Dartmouth (1826) and honorary degrees from Kings College (Nova Scotia, 1849) and Amherst (1855).
Dr. Bell practiced medicine in New Hampshire and, in 1834, won the Boylston Prize from Harvard University Medical School for a dissertation entitled “The Dietetic Regimen Best Fitted for the Inhabitants of New England.” He entered politics as a member of the State General Court and served as an advocate, leading to the establishment of the New Hampshire Asylum. In 1836, he was appointed Superintendent of the McLean Asylum for the Insane in Somerville, near Boston, where he remained until 1856.
Dr. Bell had a wide range of medical interests, including research on a form of disease “resembling advanced stages of mania and fever” later called Bell’s Disease, the completion of a book on the topic of small pox, and serving as an expert witness for the insane on judicial matters. When the Civil War broke out, Dr. Bell enlisted as a surgeon in a Massachusetts volunteer unit and became Medical Director of General Hooker’s Division. He died suddenly in the camp. Dr. Bell was one of the original 13 founders of the Association of Medical Superintendents of American Institutions for the Insane and served as President (1851–55).