Dr. David Horace Hallock eulogy

Jesse Halsey | 1950

David Horace Hallock, of sturdy Long Island ancestry, he loved his native heath, and whether the ocean in storm, or the woods in the autumn of springtime, he knew the roads and paths hereabouts and reveled in nature in all her moods.

He was a student of history and the events of the past had rivals in his interest only in the doings of the present. Not only did he observe the passing scene, but he helped create it. Not only in the first World War where he won the Purple Heart (though he never spoke of it), but in the organization of the local Legion he gave his time and strength beyond measure; a Patriot in word and action; in deed and in truth.

A good citizen contributing time, intelligence, and money to good causes in this community; the Boy Scout’s organization owes its origin and growth to him.

A scholar in his tastes with higher degrees from Hamilton and Hopkins he pursued his historical research and became a Fellow of the American Historical Society. But it was naturally, in his chose profession, where his scholarly diligence bore its largest harvest. Preparing himself, in the best schools of our time, for the practice of medicine, he, like his grandfather before him, went into general practice and became the beloved physician of many homes in the village. Such he continued, for many of us to the end, but increasingly he turned to surgery and with long and diligent application to that art became the chief of the surgical staff in the expanding Southampton hospital.

But it was as an understanding friend that we, his patients, came to rely on him, taking his professional skill unconsciously, as part of that ministry of friendship that he rendered to so many of us.

Capable but never self-assertive, always at the call of those in need he went his quiet way respected and beloved and now that his busy, useful life is finished here, two verses of Scripture come home to us, “He giveth his beloved sleep, He has earned his rest.” And this also, “His servants shall serve Him,” and Somewhere out beyond our present ken his life goes on—

“What is excellent,

As God lives, is permanent;

Hearts are dust; heart’s loves remain;

Heart’s love will meet thee again.” (Emerson)

*****

(More personal) David’s grandfather introduced me to this terrestrial ball, and he, David (or Horace as we used to call him), was there when our only child to be born in Southampton, arrived. His oldest boy was born under the same roof that first sheltered me and he died in the house built by my great-uncle, for whom I was named. Our paths crossed often, always with a hail and farewell that now becomes more imperative but not permanent. Three years ago, he pulled me out of the doldrums, climbing our steep back-stair at the sacrifice of his own strength. It was that and a thousand other “gestures of help” that finally, accumulating across the years, took him. Like so many others, I am his debtor—and am grateful.

Within a week of his passing a reserve officer wired into the Pentagon—“Available, dependable, expendable; Wire when and where.” Dave Hallock was like that—available, dependable, expendable, always everywhere.

JH