Hospital Department Bottles range in size from a 2 inch high oval shaped vial to a quart size 9 inch tall cylinder. Neck styles vary from narrow openings to a wide mouth. Whether the coloring or shape had any relation to contents is a matter of conjecture, although bottles have surfaced with paper labels indicating their original contents. Wide mouth bottles were probably used for pills. Regardless of color, all original bottles contain flaws in the glass, resultant of mid-nineteenth century manufacturing processes.
Bottles often contain numerous bubbles, sand and some examples even show a primitive whittled look.
Lips are often crude and appear hand tooled. Archaeological finds confirm that Hospital Department bottles were commonly used in the field after 1863 and that they remained in use on the frontier until the 1870 s. The Hospital Department bottle was slowly replaced by one of similar design in the post-Civil War years. The more modern bottle employs various abbreviations of U.S. Army Medical Department. Medical Department bottles remained in issue until WWII and are easily distinguished from their Civil War cousins by the quality of the glass, more refined lip and a base often designating the bottle capacity. It is a product of the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania works.