One of the most popular television shows ever was M*A*S*H, which ran for eleven seasons, from 1972-1983. If you didn't see it when it was originally on network television, you've probably seen it in reruns on cable stations. The show was about life in a mobile Army surgical hospital during the Korean War, and the reoccurring characters included the surgeons. One of those surgeons, named Charles Emerson Winchester III, was a pompous, upper-class doctor from Boston who had been drafted into the medical corps. He felt that his fellow doctors were beneath him in breeding and sophistication, and he didn't hesitate to let them know that. Nonetheless, he did his job and in fact was an excellent surgeon.

Of course, being near the front lines, that medical unit saw a lot of people die, and in one …