author
R. H. (Robert Henderson) McKay
1842–1926
A frontier doctor and memoirist, he turned his years as a United States Army medical officer into a vivid firsthand account of military life in the American West. His surviving work feels personal and practical, written to preserve real experiences for later generations.
1 Audiobook
Little Pills, an Army Story Being Some Experiences of a United States Army Medical Officer on the Frontier Nearly a Half Century Ago
by R. H. (Robert Henderson) McKay
About the author
Best known for Little Pills, an Army Story (1918), he wrote from firsthand experience as a former Acting Assistant Surgeon in the United States Army. The book presents his recollections of serving on the frontier, and library and public-domain records identify it as a personal narrative published in Pittsburg, Kansas.
In the book's foreword, he explains that he originally wrote these memories for his children and only later brought them to print after friends encouraged him. He also says he was in his 78th year when writing and recalls applying for an Army Medical Board examination in 1868, which helps place the memoir as a late-life look back at events from roughly fifty years earlier.
Reliable biographical detail beyond the book itself appears to be limited in the sources I could confirm. Based on those sources, he is remembered chiefly for this memoir of army medicine, frontier travel, and the changing American West.