Vice Admiral Nathan Cowell, MD
Name Nathan Cowell MD
Position Surgeon General, Director of Starfleet Medical
Rank Vice Admiral
Character Information
| Gender | Male | |
| Species | El-Aurian | |
| Age | 588 |
Physical Appearance
| Height | 5'6" | |
| Weight | 151 | |
| Hair Color | Grey | |
| Eye Color | Blue-Green | |
| Physical Description | Has several scars from various encounters with old Earth projectile weapons that has elected not to have dermally regenerated. |
Family
Personality & Traits
| Strengths & Weaknesses | Has a wealth of life experiences to draw upon, granting him exemplary leadership skills and practical knowledge in his chosen field of Medicine. Exhibits a gruff exterior, often considered to be grouchy and distant by people upon first meeting him. |
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| Hobbies & Interests | Reading old books, listening to music from pre-twentieth century Earth |
| Personal History | Nathan Cowell was born on the El-Aurian home world, though not under the name he currently uses, in the late 1700s of Earth’s calendar. He spent 70 years of his ‘youth’ on his home world studying Medicine until wanderlust took him and he set out to explore the galaxy. For nearly a decade, Nathan visited numerous inhabited worlds, learning languages and absorbing the cultures around him until he felt the urge to move on. Late in the year 1857, Nathan arrived on Earth and became completely enthralled with the rustic feel of the pre-Industrial age American culture. With his already extensive knowledge in the field of Medicine, Nathan decided he would take up shop in a small suburb outside of Richmond, Virginia. A few years later, the American Civil War erupted, plunging his once peaceful home into a blood battle pitting brothers against brothers. In 1861, Doc Cowell offered his services to the Union Army at the behest of some of his patients whose husbands, brothers, and the like had already been drafted or volunteered to fight. He entered in October and received a Commission at the rank of Second Lieutenant, being put in charge of a small triage camp attached to a front line Virginia unit. Throughout the war, Nathan labored behind the front lines helping the wounded, comforting the sick, and administering to the overall welfare of anyone who found themselves in his triage tent. On more than one occasion during the war, Nathan himself was forced to join in the fighting, whether because of an ambush during a move or a camp being overrun. Though it didn’t happen every time he took up a rifle, it became something of a tradition that Doc Cowell had to patch himself up before stitching up the rest of the troops around him, the scars of which he would bare for the rest of his life by choice rather than necessity. At the end of the War, Major Nathan Cowell was presented with a ceremonial pistol and saber from General Ulysses S. Grant for his service to the Union. Doc Cowell returned home after the war to reopen his practice, though he did not remain too long. It became obvious to his friends and neighbors that Nathan seemed unusually youthful despite the passage of time. In the spring of 1884, Nathan departed Virginia and moved east, finally finding a home in a small patch of land near several small towns just starting out. He made a good living as a traveling physician, even if he took a home cooked meal over money more often than not. It took him until 1896 to finally open an office, which he did in Kansas City. Not long after, the Spanish-American War broke out, though Doc Cowell declined to get involved, electing instead to remain where he was to tend to the people that had been left behind. The next 15 years were spent slowly moving west as his reputation for being extremely long lived continued to hound him. Though the never stopped practicing the medical arts, Cowell lost interest in setting up shop anywhere, content to make his living on the road. There were several points in that time that he would no sooner make it in to town then he was planning to leave. Nathan’s wanderlust landed him in Sacramento California in 1913, where he laid down temporary roots as he had lost the urge to travel. The next year, World War I broke out, and again the call for able men went out all over the country. Though he resisted having to leave, Doc Cowell again donned the uniform of an Army doctor and entered into the service of the United States. His first year in the Army was actually enjoyable, he found himself at a recruiting depot in the States screening potential troops before they enlisted. In late 1915, Captain Cowell was sent to Great Britain to run one of several Army hospitals just outside of London. His tenure at the hospital was relatively uneventful despite his proximity to the fighting. Lt. Colonel Cowell didn’t find himself on the front lines until 1917 when he was assigned to the First Infantry Division’s head physician. Nathan served out the duration of the War with 1st ID before leaving Europe and the Army, to disappear into the plains of Southern Colorado. During his time there, he met a woman who would later become his wife, a girl by the name of Elizabeth Green. The couple was never able to have children due to Elizabeth’s inability to bear children. This did not in any way tarnish their happiness as a couple, however, even if their time spent together came with its own brand of hardships. One such obstacle was Nathan’s font of perpetual youthfulness, something that he couldn’t simply move away from to remedy. Elizabeth became the first person to learn of his extraterrestrial nature; though it didn’t deter her from being with him it did account for some of their differences in opinion when arguments occurred. Before their 20th year of marriage, World War II drew the country into the thick of conflict. This conflict spilled over into the Cowell household as his wife seemed to show more patriotism than Nathan did. Being the patriot that she was, Elizabeth insisted that Nathan move with her to the East Coast, where jobs for women, and even opportunities for enlistment were abound. Having served in two wars already, Nathan was far from keen on going along with the idea, which eventually led to the couple splitting up. Though Nathan did everything in his power to avoid the draft, he finally found himself shuffled off to an Army training camp very much against his will in 1942. It didn’t take the Army long to take note of his prowess as both a medic and a leader regardless of his reluctance to be enlisted. In late 1943, Nathan found himself being promoted to Company First Sergeant in recognition of not only his prowess in combat but his ability to bolster morale in even the most demoralizing of situations. Just before the end of the year, Nathan was given a field commission in response to the company’s CO succumbed to weapons fire during an intense firefight defending a town from Nazi troops. As the war wore on, Second Lieutenant Cowell became Major Cowell as he and his men continued to fight their way to victory in the European front. Nathan declined an offer from his battalion commander to remain in country after the war, opting to return home and return to a trade that he’d abandoned for nearly thirty years. The five years spent from the end of World War II and the Korean War was peaceful enough, even if Nathan had to basically start from scratch in the medical circles. By the time the Korean War did break out, Doc Cowell found himself recalled to service in the Army thanks to his neglecting to resign his commission rather than simply separating. The Army did, however, take notice of his medical expertise, sending him to a medical unit rather than an infantry unit that he might otherwise have sent to had he not resumed his practice of medicine. He was placed in charge of a front line Medical Triage unit, where he spent the entire span of the war in command of. By 1953, Nathan had been promoted to full Colonel, which was the highest rank he’d ever been promoted to in all his years in the military. After his return to the states, Doc Cowell returned to the States and settled in the frozen tundra of Alaska, where he would remain until the Vietnam War broke out. When it did, Nathan decided it was time to depart Earth and return to his people rather than have to serve a fifth stint in the service of a military organization. The years spent between the 1960s and the 2200s remains a mystery to everyone but Nathan, who has declined to speak of those years. In 2293, Nathan Cowell returned to Earth after having been rescued by the USS Enterprise-B along with 46 other El-Aurian refugees that had been caught in the Nexus ribbon. His return to Earth was rather anti-climactic. Everything that he had known about the places he once lived had changed drastically, leaving the man rather lost as to what he would do with himself. He did, however, find that his old home in Alaska had been left untouched, thanks in part to the improvements he’d made to it as well as its remote location. The paraphernalia he’d collected during his time in the American military tugged at the man’s heart, the names and faces of the men and eventually the women that he’d served with flooding his mind as he was made to remember where he’d gotten the many things he’d collected and how those days had influenced who he was. |
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| Starfleet or Civil Service Record | Civil War Chronology 1861-1863: 2nd Lieutenant/1st Lieutenant/Captain; Field Surgeon; Union Army, Army of the Potomac 1863-1865: Captain/Major; Lead Field Surgeon; Union Army, Army of the Potomac World War I Chronology 1914-1915: 2nd Lieutenant/1st Lieutenant/Captain; Army Recruit Depot Examiner; United States Army 1915-1917: Captain/Major/Lieutenant Colonel; Hospital Administrator, London Field Hospital; United States Army 1917-1918: Lieutenant Colonel; Head Doctor, 1st Infantry Division; United States Army World War II Chronology 1942: Private; Field Medic; United States Army 1942-1943: Corporal/Sergeant/First Sergeant; Medic/Company First Sergeant; United States Army 1943-1945: First Sergeant/2nd Lieutenant/1st Lieutenant/Captain/Major; Company First Sergeant/Company Commander; United States Army Korean War Chronology 1950-1953: Major/Lieutenant Colonel/Colonel; Front Line Triage Hospital Administrator; United States Army Starfleet Chronology 2303-2304: Cadet, First Year; General Studies; Starfleet Academy 2304-2305: Cadet, Second Year; Pre-Med; Starfleet Academy 2305-2306: Cadet, Third Year; Medical Studies; Starfleet Academy 2306-2307: Cadet, Fourth Year; Medical Studies; Starfleet Academy 2307-2309: Ensign; Medical Internship; Starfleet Medical 2309-2313: Ensign/Lieutenant Junior Grade; General Practice Physician; USS Lexington NCC-1709 (Constitution Class) 2313-2319: Lieutenant Junior Grade/Lieutenant; Head Physician, General Practice; USS Repulse NCC-2544 (Excelsior Class) 2319-2326: Lieutenant/Lieutenant Commander; Assistant Chief Medical Officer, USS Victory NCC-9754 (Constellation Class) 2326-2335: Lieutenant Commander; Chief Medical Officer; USS Brattain NCC-21166 (Miranda Class) 2335-2347: Lieutenant Commander; Chief Medical Officer; USS Excalibur NCC-26517 (Ambassador Class) 2347-2358: Commander; Instructor, General Practice Medicine; Starfleet Medical 2358-2366: Captain; Chief Instructor, General Practice Medicine; Starfleet Medical 2366-2371: Captain; Dean of Medicine; Starfleet Academy 2371-2374: Captain; Commanding Officer; USS Nobel NCC-55012 (Olympic Class) 2374-2379: Captain/Commodore/Rear Admiral; Commanding Officer/Task Force Commander; USS Arizona NCC-77021 (Sovereign Class) 2379- : Vice Admiral; Director of Starfleet Medical; Starfleet Command |
