John Summerfield Battee was born on January 24, 1824 in Baltimore, Maryland.  Both he and his brother Richard entered the preparatory school in 1837 and a year later, both entered Dickinson as members of the class of 1842.  Their father, Richard Battee, Esq., was a trustee of the College.  John joined the Union Philosophical Society (as did his brother) and received his bachelor of arts degree in 1842. He returned to Maryland and received his medical degree from the University of Maryland in 1845; the following year, he studied medicine in Paris.  Returning to the United States, he became a physician in Baltimore. 

Battee served as a surgeon in the U.S. Army during the Mexican War from 1847 until 1849.  After the war, he returned to his practice in Baltimore until the outbreak of the Civil War.  He again served as a surgeon, but this time with the Navy.  Battee died in a Portsmouth, Virginia naval hospital on November 13, 1865.