Man-midwife

1775, Laurence Sterne, The Koran, Chapter XXXVII: The Man-Midwife, The Works of Laurence Sterne, page 75, She was daughter to a man-midwife; — and all that has been urged upon the former caſe, is equally referable to this one also.

1835 May 30, Evidence of Mr, Guthrie before the Parliamentary Medical Committee, The Lancet for 1834-35, Volume 2, page 287, It is the same with the man-midwife ; he has no time to devote to surgery ; if he has time, he has no means of improving his knowledge in it.

Thus, the answer to the old question of whether man-midwives or midwives were the better birth attendants is not simple. Some midwives were indeed dirty, ignorant, and dangerous; some man-midwives saved lives with their forceps; and some births were doomed to disaster.