extensive drug and medicine business that was to be carried on by
members of his family for over a century. Just why Edwin performed this
brief sojourn in Batavia, or where he made his initial entry into the
drug trade, is not clear, although the rapid growth of his firm in New
York City suggests that he had had previous experience in that field. It
is a plausible surmise that he may have worked in Batavia in the drug
store of Dr. Levant B. Cotes, which was destroyed in the village-wide
fire of April 19, 1833; the termination of Edwin's career in Batavia
might have been associated either with that disaster or with the death
of his wife in 1831.

The Comstocks also obviously had some medical tradition in their family.
Samuel's younger brother, John Lee Comstock, was trained as a physician
and served in that capacity during the War of 1812--although he was to
gain greater prominence as a historian and natural philosopher. All five
of Samuel's sons participated at least briefly in the drug trade, while
two of them also had careers as medical doctors. A cousin of Edwin,
Thomas Griswold Comstock (born 1829), also became a prominent
homeopathic physician and gynecologist in St. Louis.[1] It might also be
significant that the original home of the Comstock family, in
Connecticut, was within a few miles of the scene of the discovery of the
first patent medicine in America--Lee's "Bilious Pills"--by Dr. Samuel
Lee (1744-1805), of Windham, sometime prior to 1796.[2] This medicine
enjoyed such a rapid success that it was soon being widely imitated, and
the Comstocks could not have been unaware of its popularity.

So it seems almost certain that Edwin was no longer a novice when he
established his own drug business in New York City. Between 1833 and
1837 he employed his brother, Lucius S. Comstock (born in 1806), as a
clerk, and for the next fifteen years Lucius will figure very
conspicuously in this story. He not merely appended the designation
"M.D." to his name and claimed membership in the Medical Society of the
City of New York, but also described himself as a Counsellor-at-Law.

Edwin, the founder of the business, did not live long to enjoy its
prosperity--or perhaps we should say that he was fortunate enough to
pass away before it experienced its most severe vicissitudes and trials.
After Edwin's death in 1837, Lucius continued the business in
partnership with another brother, Albert Lee, under the style of
Comstock & Co.