The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1875-10-20
THE CONFEDERATE DOCTORS.
SECOND ANNUAL MEETING OF SUR
GEoNs OF THE SOUTHERN ARMY.
THE LATE sURGEON-GENERAL SKETCHES
THE WORK OF THE MEDICAL BUREAU. /
AN INTERE ,TINGs ADDRESS:


Where the Doctors Served During
the War. '5s!a!
FIRST DAYS SESSION.
The first regular annual meeting OF th,
Physicians and Surgeons OF the Confederate
Army and Navy was held In the hall Of tht
House Of Delegates, Ia this city, YESTERDAY
afternoon. This Society was organized OF
the Goth Of May, 1874, at meeting held il
the Senate chamber at Atlanta, Ga.
The Association was called to order shortly
after O'Clock by Dr.. S. P. Moore. president
formerly Surgeor-G OF the Confederate
States army.
THE PRESIDENTS ADDRESS.
| A quorum of members being in attend.
ance, the president read bis first annual re-
port as follows:
At the organization last year Of the Asso.
cation of Medical Officers of the Army and
Navy of the eX- Confederate medical officers ]
was honored through your kindness with the
presidency. It is my duty, therefore, to
welcome yoa TO this heroic city. This is
| doue with pleasure, pride, and pain. It is
very pleasant to meetagain after long years Of
| separation-to see the familiar faces of those
who worked go lovingly for the Z" Lost
Cause"; with pride, for the Confederate
| medical officers were inferior to none in
any army with pain, for many a
| worthy member of our department
we shall see no more forever. 1t is
| much to be regretted that the public docu.
meuts belonging to our department have
| been lost or destroyed. apprehend much
difficulty VIII be experienced by those gen.
tlemen appointed at our last meeting to
make reports on various subjects connected
with the medical history of the war, for
| without the necessary data perfect reports
| cannot be made Or expected.
WORK OF coEFEDER ATE MEDICAL BUREAUS.
1t might prove interesting, and with your
permission / propose to give sketch ol
some of the work performed by the medical
bureaus during the four years of the war.
Ou being placed in charge of the depart
meut (which was after the first blttle Of Ma.
nassas) attention was at once .direc.e to the
accommodation of the sick and wounded,
which was very defective and not meeting
! the demands of the service.
The only building in Richmond adapted to
hospital purposes, the almshouse "a large
| brick building, well suited, capable Of &C.
commodating say five hundred patients), bad
| been converted into hospital and occupied
| bv the wounded OF the northern army from
| the battle lust mentioned. The Confederate
| wounded from the same battle were treated
| at private houses, in small unoccupied wood
en- buildings and small tobacco-facto
ries improVised as hospitals. There
were serious objections to this method o.
treatment of the sick and wounded, the
principal being the liability Of spreading
CONTAGIOUS diseases among the inhabitants o
| the city the aggregation OF so many patients
! in the necessarily large wards of the facto
res, thereby communicating the buildings,
rendering them unfit for occupancy and the
impossiblity of supplying by these means
the further demands of the service. TIC
meet as far as practicable these require
ments, the plan was adopted Of erecting
buj,dings, each one to be ward and sepa'
rate, of undressed plank set upright, cilcu.
lated for thirty.two beds, with streets run
ming each way, say thirty feet wide. From
fifteen to twenty of such wards constituted
division, three or more divisions making
general hospital. Each division was separate
and distinct, having all the appliances o.
8 hospital, but under the supervision anC
control of the surgeon in charge of the
general hospital. There were FIVE of these
!hospitals in the suburbs Of Richmond, erect
ed in 1861. At a rough estimate twenty
thousand patients were at one time treated a.
these general hospitals. TIE plan proved tc
be excellent, and the temporary hospita
buildings in the city were abandoned as soor
as practicable. the larger factories only being
retained and used. This segregation OF The
sick and wounded was highly beneh
cial, If the condition Of ward. from
whatever cause, required its abandonment
it was done without trouble or much cost to
the Government. 1t may be stated that cases
of hospital gangrene were, as a 1u!e, re
moved from wards and treated in tents with
decided bercft. General hospitals, or
this plan, were established whenever
or wherever deemed necessary. Thl:
was sometimes attended with delay; tol
the Medical Department, instead OF beln!
an independent bureau, building ant
furnishing hospitals, had to depend entirely
upon the quartermas:er and commtssary de-
partments, hence much delay was eXpe
rienced in obtaining proper hospital accom-
moda:ons, and IN such cases blame was al
tached TO the medical bureau which 1t neve
deserved.
| ,s.r.- CAMP DISEASES. -. ..':..
\ This extensive pan bospltsll accoiblhe
. dation was decried at the time, and wa
deemed wholly Unnecessary. but the fact wa
overlooked that troops on active service ar
more or less subject to certain camp diseases
TO wit: Fevers of low type, dysentery, ant
diarrhpa. 1t should also. nave beel
remembered that large majority of tn
Confederate soldiers being from rura
and up.ceuntry districts, had neEe
, had the different contagious disease
to which residents of more populous district
!. are exposed, especially scallet.iever ana mea
sizes: Jew had ever been vaccinated; the.
would therefore, in all probability, contrac
these diseases, thus swelling the SICK Isl
The result proved that unnecessary precau
tion had not been taken in having larg
hosrita accommodation for onr troops sui
fered severely from these diseases, NOR
especially mess'es.
.,..r CAPABLE MEDICAL MEN,. !
The next subject for consideration wa
70 have medical men capable of dis
charging the duties of medical officer
: both in hospital and field service, 10
tbe lives of Officers and men were to
importaut to entrust to incompetent hand:
Although there were many capital medlca
men in the medical corps, yet, from the cas-
manner by which commissions were ootaine
; TOR medical officers appointed to regiments
MANY were supposed not to be properl
. qualified. 1t was therefore deemed nc
Visable 10 establish army medical boards 10
the examination of the medical ohcels a.
pnnItPlRfG IN