- Medicinal Usage - Indian uses of this native tree are not we documented, but one source mentions that they employed a decoction, or extract, from the boiled bark to help support symptoms of infections. Black haw's service as an early home supplement, by contrast, is well recorded. - Although the plant was used in the early 1800's, the first published mention of it appeared in 1857, in the Family Physician, by Dr. John King, who described it as a "uterine tonic". Doctors largely prescribed a dec