Excerpt from The Medical Department in the Civil War

When on April 12, 1861, we heard that the flag had been fired on at Fort Sumter, a universal sense of insult roused the North. The churches North and South fell apart and the pulpit knew no more the charity which covers a multitude of sins. Even the old patriotic society of the Cincinnati lost its unity. Officers of the army and navy made their choice with which section they would stand, and it may be strange to you to learn the little-known fact that of W est Point Southern graduates nearly 50 per cent. Remained loyal to the flag as men of the North read loyalty, at what cost of family affection lost and of broken friendships you can easily imagine. It was very long after the war before these wounds were healed and innumerable family differences passed away. Alas. In some cases sectional hatreds were carried unsettled to another world than ours.

Not without reason have I made this digression. The ancient guild of physicians alone remained an unbroken organization - the offspring of Science and Charity, faithful to a creed centuries old when Christ was born. In hospitals and on the field of battle, where the surgeon ruled, there was the truce of God; and Letterman, the able surgeon-in-chief of the Army of the Potomac, merely put conduct into words when he said, The wounded man ceases to be an enemy. I despair of making you realize through statistics the vastness of our task. Large figures only bewilder theimagination and do not fully assist it to realize how perfect was our achievement through those years of disaster and final triumph, Which blazoned duty's stainless shield And set a star in honor's sky.

How were we prepared to meet the demands of war? The old medical department of the army con sisted of thirty surgeons and eighty-three assistants. Of these, twenty-four resigned to take part in the rebellion and three were dismissed for disloyalty; thirteen were natives of the South, but stood true to the flag. Soon after the beginning of the war it was found necessary, owing to age, to permit the surgeon general to retire. Owing largely to pressure made by the Sanitary Commission and the profession, his place was filled by raising from the rank of assistant sur geon Dr. William A. Hammond. He fell at once into a tremendous business spreading over great spaces of country, increasing in perplexity, and making fresh demands every week, and at last so large that there was expended for ice alone in one year more than the whole amount of money which in peace sufficed for the entire medical service of the army. The organization also demanded complete revision, and, in fact, as the new surgeon-general said, there was not an aspect of his work which was not foggy with embarrassments.

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