Words on image: @IrememberOurHistory®- Correcting Identities(TM): This image of Dr. Georgia E. Lee Patton Washington is often used on memes and posts about Dr. Rebecca Lee Crumpler. There are no known surviving photographs nor images of Dr. Rebecca Lee Crumpler.

Description of image: 1893 portrait of Georgia E. Lee Patton, M.D. Physician, and Surgeon, a Meharry [Meharry Medical College] Graduate, African Missionary.

Dr. Georgia E. Lee Patton Washington (April 16, 1864 – November 8, 1900) was an American missionary and physician. Following her education, she served as a medical missionary in Liberia. She was the first Black woman to become a licensed surgeon and physician in Tennessee.
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Bio
Georgia E. Lee Patton Washington (April 16, 1864 – November 8, 1900) was an American missionary and physician. Following her education, she served as a medical missionary in Liberia. She was the first Black woman to become a licensed surgeon and physician in Tennessee.

Early life
Patton was born on April 15, 1864, into an enslaved family in Tennessee. She had a twin sister who did not survive birth. Patton's father died before her birth. Although she was born in Grundy County, Tennessee, her mother decided to move to Coffee County in 1866 after the Civil War. Her mother supported the family by working as a laundress until her death in 1880.

As the youngest of the family, Patton was often treated with favoritism and her mother would not allow her to engage in washing and spinning as her older sisters did. On the other hand, and because of her love for nature, she started learning the plowing trade from a very early age.
At the age of sixteen, Patton's mother died, leaving her alone and forcing her to move to the home of one of her older sisters. After the death of her mother, Patton started to look for ways to become an educated woman,

Educational opportunities for formerly enslaved Black people in Coffee County were limited but Patton managed to complete high school, the only one in her family to do so. By February 1882, Patton’s siblings had saved enough money to send her to Central Tennessee College in Nashville.

Patton faced financial challenges while in school and frequently missed class to work. She graduated in 1890. In 1893, Georgia Patton earned her medical degree from the Meharry Medical Department of Central Tennessee College as one of the school’s two female graduates. Only one other woman previously had graduated from Meharry.

Medical missionary
Patton was deeply attached to religion and was part of the Methodist Episcopal Church. Although she did not officially have the support of the church and had to bear the expenses of the trip, she decided to travel to Liberia as a medical missionary. After graduation, Patton went to Liberia as a missionary, where she hoped to use her new medical skills to assist Liberians in need. When her church’s missionary society refused to fund her trip, Patton raised the money on her own. In April 1893, she left for Liverpool, England.

On the ship, she roomed with Ida B. Wells-Barnett, the famous anti-lynching activist who recorded the women’s seasickness during the voyage. Patton then traveled to Monrovia, Liberia, where she worked as a doctor and missionary for two years.

After Patton arrived to Liberia on April 5, 1893, another African American missionary started to draw attention to the lack of professional health care in the country. Medicine such as quinine was already available, but there were no emergency doctors. During her time there, she identified anemia and dropsy as chronic ailments that mainly affected the Kru, the dominant ethnic group in Monrovia.

On her trip, Patton recognized the value of learning about native treatments to face the infections and illnesses that plagued the vast majority of her patients. In the search for a cure and an effective treatment for the Guinea worm, Patton developed the methods of "strapping" and "shafting", offering directions to other medical professionals about said techniques.

Later years
After her two-year long experience in Liberia as a medical missionary, Patton returned to the United States in order to continue her education with a post-graduate course in medicine. During her return trip, she was infected with tuberculosis and never regained her previous health. She settled in Memphis and started a private medical practice, becoming the first Black female doctor in Tennessee.

On December 29, 1897, she married letter carrier David W. Washington, and two years later, in 1899, they had their first son, Willie Patton Washington, who died days after his birth. The couple had met through their active volunteering in their church and community. Patton was a very respected member in her community, for her monthly ten-dollar donation to the Freedmen's Aid Society and was often called "Gold Lady" due to her generosity.

In the last few years of her life, Patton worked sporadically due to her poor health. She died on November 8, 1900, in the city of Memphis, four months after giving birth to her second child, David W. Washington Jr, who died soon after his mother.

She is buried in Zion Christian Cemetery on South Parkway where an historic marker notes her accomplishments.

Sources: Wikipedia; Blackpast