"They Perished in the Cause of Science": Justus von Liebig's Food for Infants.

This article focuses on the 1867 controversy surrounding Justus von Liebig’s artificial infant food, which was tested by French accoucheur Jean-Anne-Henri Depaul on four newborns who subsequently died. It examines the origins of Liebig’s formula, debates within the French Academy of Medicine, and the broader public and transnational press reactions, highlighting tensions involving scientific authority, medical ethics, national rivalry between France and Germany, and the challenges of replicating natural breast milk through chemistry. Despite initial failures and ethical concerns, Liebig’s product influenced the growing commercial infant food industry in the late nineteenth century, though experts continued to emphasize breastfeeding as the optimal infant nutrition. The case illustrates the complex interplay of science, medicine, public trust, and nationalism in the evolving field of infant feeding during this period.