Medical
Officer.
Location and
movements.
SIRHIND DIVISION.
101
These figures need, I think, no comment. The severe duties of the large convoy especially,
told on the rig.ht-half battalion, it, with an average strength of 234.06, losing 7 men (died) on
the march to Quetta; whilst head-quarters on the same march, with an average strength of 358.69,
not losing a single man. The brackish water affected almost every one without exception very
disagreeably ; when not causing severe illness, it gave rise to looseness of the bowels, with very
severe griping pains. The prevalence of certain disorders changed very regularly with the vary-
ing conditions under which the regiment was placed; the prevalent disease being invariably such
as was to be expected. Thus at Mooltan, in October and early part of November, men were in
thin tents on a hot plain, subjected to great heat in the day, with comparatively chilly nights ;
and, as might be expected, malarial affections predominated enormously, the total treated for them
being 146 ; while only 11 were treated for bowel complaints. In the next month, when the day
temperature was still high and nights cold, we have still numerous malarial affections, total treated
109 ; but in this month we have a second factor, bad water, and we find total treated for bowel
complaints, 61. In the third mouth, when the temperature fell, we find a remarkable change in
malarial affections, total treated now being reduced to 25. But in the early part of the
month the water was still very bad, until the regiment entered the Bolan Pass. Hence we
had bowel complaints 47 total treated, nearly all being admissions in the early part of the
mouth. The records of the right-half battalion show equally clearly, the connection in disease
between cause and effect, and how regularly certain diseases will result from certain conditions.
Inspection.—This regiment was not inspected during 1878.
Inspection.
12th (The Relat-i-Bhilzi) Regt., flat. Enfg.—Jullundur.
I. Medical Officer. —Surgeon F. J. Tuohy, M.D., has held medical charge
of the corps during the whole
of the year.
II. Location and movements.
— T h e h e a d - q u a r t e r s w a s s t a t i o n e d
at Jullundur from 1st January to
28th September. It was ordered
on active service and left by rail
for Mooltan on 30th September,
reaching Gulistan Karez on 31st
December.
III. Topography, &c. —The topo-
graphy have been fully described in
Surgeon-Major Verchere's report
of the 13th Native Infantry for
1869. Early in September, after
a very heavy rainfall lasting for
several days, the East and West
Beyn overflowed their banks, sub-
merging almost the whole of the
Jullundur Doab, including the can-
tonments, the whole country being under water for three days, and swept away about 3 miles
of the railway embankment between the Sutlej and Beas rivers. The atmosphere in cantonments
for some days after the water subsided was most pestilential, myriads of small fish were left on
the plains about the cantonments, and when they commenced to rot under the influence of a
strong sun, the stench was intolerable. Luckily the head-quarters of' the regiment were ordered
off before the severe epidemic of fever (malarious) manifested itself.
VIII. Water-suppty. —At Mooltan the water in the wells in the Native Infantry lines
occupied by the regiment was not good. Dysentery was very prevalent while stationed there. On
the march from Mithankote to Dadur the water was especially bad at the following encamping,
grounds, it being brackish, bitter and quite saline to the taste, and flowing from a barren ni-
trous soil :—Camp Bundawalla, Kubradana, Mundikund, Lote, Soor-i-duff. It caused an enormous
amount of diarrhœa and dysentery in the corps, and two sepoys died in a few hours of acute
diarrhœa who were absolutely poisoned by drinking the water at Kubradana.
IX. Diet andlood-supply.— At Jullundur and Mooltan the supplies were plentiful. At
the latter place vegetables were scarce. The rations issued to the men on service were
according to the scale laid down in paragraph 644, Bengal Army Regulations. The seer of
coarse and inferior atta, issued by the Commissariat Department at Mithankote, when sifted and
separated from the bran, never yielded more than three-fourths of a seer and often less. 1 T h e t w o
chittacks of dhal were useless as an article of diet; it was hard and several years' old, and after a
futile attempt to cook it in the brackish water, the men had invariably to throw it away as uneat-
able ; the ghee was indifferent; salt fair. For the hard and continuous marching the men had to
undergo, the ration they received was totally inadequate to keep them in health, and it told on
1 This is probably exceptional. In a large number of trials made, the bran was found never to exceed 5/32 and to
average barely 3/52.—R. E.
A 1
YEAR.
STATION.
PER CENT. OF STRENGTH.
Admissions. Deaths. Daily sick.
1873 . Peshawar, Feb. 1873,
from Sialkot.
265.3
1.8
10.8
1874 . Ditto . . . . 189.9
2.2
5.5
1875 . Ditto . . . . 248.12
5.14
6.78
1876 . Jullundur, Feb. 1876 . 265.49
1.72
6.27
1877 . Ditto . . . . 162.4
. 2 3 1
5.35
Average
. 226.24
2.63
6.94
1878 . Jullundur ; marched on
active service in Afgan-
istau, 30th Sept. 1878.
262.41 4.42
7.38
Topography,
&c.
Water-supply.
Diet and
food-supply.