Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1892-09-22
IN THE MEDICAL MUSEUM.
Where Visitors VIII Find Some Ghssi
Reminders OF the War.

Where Visitors VIII Find Some Ghsssly
Reminders OF the War.
Did you leave o leg az Antietam7
Would you like to see that arm thss 700
dropped at Gettysburg?
Dad you have any limbs at all taken on BIZ
the surgeons knife during the war?
Ii you did, and IL you have any morbid on
riosity to see your erstwhile useful appendAgo,
if you would like to shake hands with come
srisly fingers or look again upon the bone of q
toe which perhaps once bore acorn that caused
you deal Of trouble In your army broganS
you may have an opportunity 10 do 80.
There is a place here in Washington called
the Army Medical Museum They have One
collection there Of war relics in the shape Of
amputated legs and arms-choice specimens
culled from the surgeons table after many .
sanguinary battle. They are all labeled and per-
haps you can find yours among them.
1t would be like meeting long-lost friend,
wouldn't it2 Kind Of funny, eh, TO see again
that leg which helped to carry you over many
a mile Of weary march and of which you we're
deprived by old sawbones' instruments thess
thirty years ago?
Doubtless you would not recognize In this
bleached and shattered bone your once shapely
limb, which in your younger days was Q source
Of pride. But you could still feel O sense Of
proprietorship. in It, ss Of some old garment
that had done you good service in days Of
yore.
There are several hundred skulls there, too,
in ghasSly rows on the shelves, grinning At you
behind the glass cases You are not likely 10
meet any old acquaintance In that line, how
ever, for these were picked up on battlefelds
or we're taken from the bodies Of uukpova
dead No doubt there are many confederate
craniuns among them. and 1t would be an odd
conceit TO think that perhaps one Of them was
the skull Of the man who shattered your leg.
You might console yourself With the thought
that you had rather have your leg bone in thss
glass case than your skull and that you have
kind Of got the bes. Of your friend, the rebel
There are lots Of things 10 interest you In
the Medical Museum. Il ID located In . big
brick building At the corner Of tn and B
streets southwest and d reached BY The 7th
street cable cars. The hrst thing you run
across as you enter the museum 10 coliecsiou
Of surgical instruments, which may give you .
little shock; they are 90 suggestive looking.
But right here let IL be said that man q
weak nerves should stay away from the Army
Medical Museum There ere sights 10 b ssso
there that make fellows desh crswl After
an hour or so spent In viewing that layout Of
CHASTITY and grewsome things and IN seeing the
effects of accident and disease . man almost
hesitates to put his foot TO the ground for fear
Of breaking something within him. The stghts
are presented with . startling realism and one
can almost see the blood drip and The assh
culver on some Of the specimens of gunshoe
WoundA
There are some things In bottles one les q
which sutices, but let that pes
Upstairs in oblong glass cases ere Q fev
specimens of the human form divine IN vNrlp
Gus stages Of disease and decay that ass nose
wildly realistic. They are made Of vux, life
size, tinted 70 represent The nesh - 10 appear
In the life. Horrible faces, torn snd shstssrsd
by saber and shell; features distorted end
MANNED by diseases that have long Latin psnes,
sections Of arms and legs thss have bssn am
putated, with arteries and veins dangling froo
them. There are . couple Of hands Of man
Who had the Ieprosy. The artist hes repro
duced them with such hfelike accuracy thss
one can almost see the reeking hesh dropping
from the rotting bonea
Ughi Lots pass on.
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