The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1898-06-08


those who were killed outright in bat
tie was i3 to 81, OF not far from to
IL. These figures are taken from the
report Of the adjutant generals Office.
The statistics on the Confederate side
arc less exact, but it may be assumed
that the proportion there was about
,hc same. As there would be little
chance of finding out whether 81 man
found dead on the field before medical
assistance had reached him had or had
not been killed nstantancou.ly Is, it
may be also assumed that died Of
wounds means died in hospital
the inference being that death was the
result Of the wounds.
1t is some comfort u know. now
that the United States is engaged in
another armed struggle, that the
number of deaths from wounds is not
likely to be as much as 80 per cent as
large, in proportion to the number Of
wounds received, as it was either in
the civil war or in any other prior to
The present generation. And this in
spite Of the more than tcn-fold in
creased dcstructi,cness Of latter day
weapons.
The reason and ground Of this hope
arc not in the nature Of the Krag-
Jorgenscn and Mauscr rifles, used
respectively by our own and the Span
ish armies, but in the astounding
progress in the last twenty years in
the art Of surgery. is not because
man who is hit by an up-to date
rife bullet more often dies on the
Spot, FOR that this is the case is very
far from certain. During the first,
third and fourth quarters Of modern
nickel-coated slug's flight its rcnding
effect is terribly fatal, it is true, but
in the second quarter, or "human
area" Of its range it has tendency
to cut a clean hole. But all expert
cncc of recent years indicates that
where nine wounded men out of ten
would have been buried from field
hospital in the years between 1861
and 1865, only four would die in the
year 1898, the other six being even
tually discharged safe, whole and
probably in better health than they
enjoyed before they were wounded.
In fact, "died Of Wounds so far
as it applies to the wars Of past gene
rations, including our own civil war,
really means in most cases that death
resulted from hospital gangrcne, -
hospital fever or crysipclas. The
surgeons Of those days were quite
aware of these symptoms, but their
causes had not yet been discovered.
1t was supposed chat the atmosphere
of hospital was impregnated with a
subtle, impalpablc infection, which
could only be combatcd after it had
begun to show it's effect in suppura-
tion. One fluid result of this infec-
tion was even called, quantity enough,
"laudable pus.' because, ON the
theory that Il certain degree Of suppu-
ration vas unavoidable. IL vas regarded
az hopeful sign when the wound
threw of the troublesome humor,
which, if keptin would produce fcver.
twas not then known, perhaps hardly
even suspected, that the surgeon him
self was actually inoculating patient
after patient with Il terrible, specific
disease
The surgeons Of the civil war would,
doubtless. have been very much sur
prised to hear that their hands. hasti-
ly rinscd in cold hydrant or spring
water, were busy carrying from wound
to wound. hundreds Of organisms, the
proper name Of which was, or was to
be, 'streptococcus pyrogcnes. y Two
medical discoveries, one, in the honest
sense of the word, empirical, the other
resulting from purely scicntiflcal in
vcstigation, led to the detection and
apprehension Of this wholesale assas-
sin
Many Il surgeon, before the year
1878, would have been glad to know
how 1t might be possible to amputate
legs and arms without suppuration.
Many tried for Il solution of the
problem, although most were, no
doubt, content to take things as they
found them. welcome the appearance
OF their "laudablc pus, and fight the,
to them, inevitable "hospital fever"
1t was Joseph Lister, whose name is
now known to every surgical ward in
the world who first, as Il veteran sur
geon lately expressed it. started the
hounds on the right scent when they
were all at fault "
This shrewd Scotch surgeon, coming