Civil War Medicine, Surgery, and Sanitation: 3D Gallery

Civil War Surgeons

The qualifications for a surgeon at the time of the Civil War were very loose. In order to be a practicing surgeon, one had to simply practice with a surgeon as an apprentice and take a few simple courses at a medical college to be an approved surgeon. Due to this, many surgeons in the war were inexperienced. The procedures carried out in the war were often spontaneous and offered little diagnosis prior to surgery. However, the importance of these surgeons is unrequited. Without these brave souls who did the dirty work many others would shun, the death toll of soldiers would have been even higher. Their bravery allowed for soldiers to have a fighting chance of surviving.

The Early Medical Camps

These medical camps were often put up spontaneously. The main objective of these medical tents was to identify the primary problems with the soldier and the quickest procedures to help them. Due to the number of gunshot wounds and amputated limbs, the camps were described as smelling "rancid" and extremely crowded and dirty. Doctors had no knowledge about the dangers of bacteria and poor hygiene. Soldiers would be sporadically treated and then neglected for days on end due to a lack of organization. The state of these primitive camps were so bleak that poet Walt Whitman described them as "grim clusters."

Overview of Civil War Medicine Kits

The photo above depicts a typical medical kit carried by the doctors involved in combat. The typical kit consisted of scissors, gauze, and needles used to sew up soldier's wounds in combat. As expected, the kits were very rudimentary and were unable to provide adequate help in many cases. The only pain killer often included in the kits were morphine, but many surgeons saved this for the worst of cases. For those that were not fatally wounded, they would typically be given shots of whiskey to dull the pain.

Lasting Impact of Civil War Medicine and Surgery

Upon arrival to a field hospital, soldiers were divided into three categories based upon their injury: mortally wounded, partially wounded, and cases requiring surgery. Soldiers would be treated to the best of the hospital's provisions, although many were ineffective. However, as the war neared it's later years, the hospitals became more adept at caring for both injuries and disease. Cleaner environments and a deeper understanding of bacterial infections and sicknesses allowed for medical areas to be safe for the afflicted. Yet, many soldiers had their limbs amputated since they had already succumbed to infection. They would have to learn to walk or use their other limbs more effectively with the lack of the one they lost. These soldiers were not allowed back into combat and were either sent home or kept among the ranks to do work around the camps.

Johnathan Letterman

Johnathan Letterman was the Medical Director of the Army of the Potomac. He played a massive role in the advancement of medicine during the time of the Civil War. He promoted an increased attention to organization in hospitals; the mortally wounded had to be treated quicker than those who were slightly injured. He also emphasized the importance of evacuating injured personnel from combat. He developed an extensive system of ambulances so that he could evacuate men from combat to hospitals. The impact of Letterman was extremely crucial to the development of modern warfare practices of caring for the wounded. His protocols designed for removing wounded soldiers from combat are even replicated to this day by armies all over the world.

William A. Hammond

William A. Hammond was the Surgeon General of the Union Army from 1862-1864. Hammond was another crucial part to the development of field medicine for the Union Army during the Civil War. His biggest accomplishment was his design of newer, more helpful field hospitals. These hospitals were well-ventilated, so they would no longer be hot and miserable for those who were inside. This design also allowed for a greater capacity of the sick and wounded to be cared for. Hammond also strongly emphasized the utmost importance of hygiene and cleanliness in hospitals. He wrote a code called Treatise on Hygiene that strictly defined the standards of cleanliness these hospitals were supposed to follow.

IGNORE

One of the biggest killers of the civil war was not injuries from fights. In fact, more soldiers were killed from diseases than they were in combat. As the historian Anthony Hodges explains, dysentery and diarrhea were prevalent during the war. Doctors back then had a minimal understanding of what actually caused diseases. Archaic treatments, such as bleeding and leeching, were implemented with no real positive results on the soldiers. The lack of understanding of the diseases led to almost 2x as many deaths outside of combat than those that were in combat. The idea of antibiotics were relatively unheard of then, yet the acceptance of the Germ Theory enabled doctors to experiment in ways of diminishing infection and disease.

Summary of Civil War Medicine

The Civil War brought about massive changes in the advancement of medicine. Surgeons and doctors from all over the country began to rethink their practices and expanded ways to help people. Medical understanding of infection and bacteria allowed for the casualty rate of the wounded to drop to only 8% at the end of the war. Although the means of treatment started out as barbaric, the expertise of the doctors is underestimated. The war pushed the capabilities of doctors to their limits and had them exceed what they thought was the normal. Their devout resolution to care for the soldiers was what made medicine accelerate its research and methods of treatment. Without the various achievements made by those in the medical field during the war, medicine would be years behind what it is now.

The Music Lesson

The Music Lesson or Lady at the Virginals with a Gentleman by Jan Vermeer, is a painting of young female pupil receiving the titular music lesson. [more]

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Civil War Medicine, Surgery, and Sanitation