How To Treat Wounds In The Civil War

The Civil War is known as a central event in American History. The war was fought between the Union States and the Confederate States from 1861-1865. When people reflect on the Civil War, they often think of victory and defeat. They never bother to go behind the scenes. People that aren’t mentioned in most history textbooks are surgeons.

Medicine played and still plays a major part in the world. However, modern medicine did not prosper until long after the civil war, which we can assure are some of the reasons many soldiers and residents lives were compromised. From amputations, sanitation, a lack of surgeons and supplies with, contagious fevers and diseases a great deal of people went long winters and summers suffering from things that doctors were incapable of curing solely based on the fact medicine had not reached the level of quality and quantity it needed to be at the time.

How were injured soldiers treated during the circus war? How does our medical treatments now compare to how they were treated before? Did the way injured soldiers were treated have to do with the cause of their death? Wounds were treated very differently to how they’re treated now and it always makes people wonder how people still survived and were able to live longer. It all reflects on technology, transportation, antiseptic practices, and surgical techniques. Throughout war and history more soldiers died from diseases than they did from injuries and often the medical treatments they would get for their injuries wouldn’t make them better but worse and it was what caused more deaths.

When people picture the Civil War amputations, they often picture piles of limps stacked around a battlefield and a surgeon as a butcher. However, this picture is not true to the real nature of battlefield medicine. Amputation was the most common surgery throughout the Civil War. The Civil War leads to advancement in amputation and quality of life for those who had amputation. Artificial limbs also came into the picture helping former soldiers lead a better quality life.

The medicines and medical techniques used during the Civil War were very primitive for their time. Extremely little was known about germs and the dangers of infections. In Recovery, it is stated that, “Treating wounds and illnesses with medication had become common—opiates, stimulants, sedatives, diuretics, purgatives, and more were widely available and used. The first pills had been made in the early 1800s. The stethoscope and the

The Civil War had a tremendous death toll. In fact, it had more deaths than any of the previous wars combined. At the time, it was thought that the soldiers in battle died from the wounds or amputations they received. The true cause of death came from disease. These harsh conditions were contributed by unqualified doctors and non-sterile equipment. During the Civil War, the true issue was not only the wounds received in battle but the infectious diseases that ultimately led to the soldier’s death. When this was discovered, doctors knew some action needed to take place. Hospitals and sanitation standards were improved. The Civil War contributed to an evolution of medicine and how to combat victims plagued with disease.

John Burford, a Brigadier General, had received a bullet to the knee during the Second Battle of Manassas. Luckily Buford’s bullet wound wasn’t too serious. If the wound had been serious, it would have been treated with amputations and since there were no anesthetics back then, the person getting amputated on would feel all the pain. Surgeries during the Civil War were performed unsanitary. Surgeons would not wash their hands before operating and would wear blood splattered clothing. The instruments used for operating were never disinfected properly. Instead, they would dip their instruments in cold water, often bloody from the prior operation. Buford had died in December 1863 of

One of the first nurses to see battle injuries was Ms. Fannie Beers who described the arrival of the first 200 soldiers at a makeshift hospital “they came with some form of disease whether on foot or stretcher, barefoot or on swollen feet”. (12) The battlefront hospitals were only that of open area sites with conditions anything but sanitary, with blood, human waste and amputated limbs covering the ground. The first battle women encountered was with their selves. Only their strong religious faith steeled them against sickening sights of disease and infection. These nurses learned to rein in their feelings and believed patients redemption hallowed their work.

During the Civil War, they had to have many medicines, operations, and surgeries done to themselves or others in order to survive (Jenny Goellnitz, Paragraph 1). Some of these medicines we still use today. Medical technology and scientific knowledge have changed dramatically since the Civil War, but the basic principles of military health care remain the same. The deadliest thing that faced the Civil War soldier was disease. For every soldier who died in battle, two died from disease.

During the Civil War the only major problem second to getting shot in the face, was a shot to the chest. At the time doctors did not really understand how to treat a wound of that type, and usually the major issue was the negative pressure exerted outwards, leading to the collapse of the lungs and soon after, suffocation. Contributing to this problem, the doctors observed that during their war, the french had an 8 percent survival rate from major damage to the chest, leading to many medical practitioners to simply refuse treating chest wounds. Early into the war, however, soldiers would be blessed with the miracle of knowledge, knowledge of how to close chest wounds. Benjamin Howard, a young assistant surgeon, otherwise known as a cub surgeon,

The Civil War began because of uncompromising differences between free and slave states over the power of government, in April 12, 1861. Most people died in the Civil War because of deadly diseases. The Battle of Gettysburg is considered the most important event in the Civil War. Soldiers fought from July first to July third 1863. Do soldiers really know how to treat an injury during a war? In the book The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara’s published in 1974, we are exposed to historical figures that could have treated their injuries and made them minor if they had modern medicine. With the medical training we have today the figures could have saved their limbs and known how to take better care of themselves in such uncomfortable situations.

these first medical centers from the civil war. As I mentioned before the civil war paved

The Civil War was fought with much carnage, and was one of America’s most ‘uncivilized’, wars with a soldier’s chance of survival about twenty-five per cent. While many were killed by other soldiers, usually through bullets, a large portion died as a result of disease such as: dysentery, mumps, pneumonia, typhoid fever, measles, and tuberculosis, diseases that are curable today. These diseases were spread through the horribly sanitized camps found on both sides of the war: Confederate and Union. And while many died from disease, some died from other soldiers’ bullets; these deaths may have been prevented if the technology, or overall techniques used by surgeons, during this time period were more up-to-date, as amputations were the main procedure

Chest and abdominal wounds were nearly always fatal. Treatment of abdominal wounds often involved pushing in protruding organs and suturing the wound. Food was withheld because fecal material leaking from the intestines caused contamination. Opium was often administered to halt the action of the digestive system. Chest wounds were cleaned and the wound was sutured. Abdominal wounds were fatal in almost 90 percent of the cases reported by Union surgeons.

Dr. Jonathan Letterman a medical director for the union army started up a planned named after him that would kick start a brand new way to look and work triage in the battle field. Though the method of triage was being used all around the world the union army was the first to put this into practice regularly. Letterman’s plan was based off of a 3- tier system: most serious but survivable wounds are first, less serious wounds are second, and likely fatal wounds (head, abdomen, ect) are last priority (Letterman). As this plan fell into place it brought on other ideas with it, it brought up the idea of aid stations and evacuation. Letterman’s plan was not just based around triage but many other ideas that modern medicine still uses to this day. Dr. Jonathan Letterman is remembered as “The father of modern battlefield and emergency medicine.”