The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1898-06-08
MODERN SURGERY in WAR.
1t Reduces the Mortality From Wounds
Fifty Per Gent
Boston Herald.

Boston
In the civil war the proportion Of
Union soldiers who died of wounds to
those who were killed outright in bat
tie was 43 to 81, or not far from to
IL. These figures are taken from the
report of the adjutant general 8 Office.
The statistics on the Confederate side
are less exact, but it may be assumed
that the proportion there was about
the same. As there would be little
chance of finding out whether man
found dead on the field before medical
assistance had reached him had or had
not been killed instantaneously, it
may be also assumed that died Of
wound" means ''died in hospital, "
the inference being that death was the
result of the wounds.
It's some comfort to 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 so 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 ten-fold in
creased destructiveness Of latter-day
weapons.
The reason and ground of this hope
are not in the nature Of the Krag-
Jorgensen and Mauser 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. It's 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 a modern
nickel-coated slug's fight its rending
effect is terribly fatal, it is.true, but
in the second quarter, or shuman
area, Of Its range it has tendency
to cuts clean hole. But ali expert
ence Of recent years indicates that
where nine wounded men out of ten
would have been buried from field
hospital in the years between 1861
4 and 1865, only four would die in the
year 1893, the other six being even
tually discharged safe, whole and
probably in better health than they
enjoyed before they were wounded.
In fact, ssdied 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 gangrene, =
Hospital fever OF erysipelas. The
surgeons Of those days we're quite
aware Of these symptoms, but their
causes had not yet been discovered.
Itwas supposed that the atmosphere
Of q hospital was impregnated with a
subtle, impalpable infection, which
could only be combated after it had
begun to show its effect in suppura-
ton. One fluid result of this infec-
tion was even called, quantity enough,
eslaudable pus. because, on the
theory that certain degree Of suppu-
ration was unavoidable, itwas regarded
as hopeful sign when the wound
threw of the troublesome humor,
which, if keptin, would produce fever.
Itwas rot then known, perhaps hardly
even suspected, that the surgeon him.
self was actually inoculating patient
after patient with terrible, specific
disease.
The surgeons Of the civil war would,
doubtless, have been very much sur
prised to hear that their hands, hasti-
ly rinsed in cold hydrant or spring
water, we're busy carrying from wound
to wound, hundreds of organisms, the
proper name of which was, or was to
be, 'streptococcus pyrogenes. . Two
medical discoveries, one, in the honest
sense Of the word, empirical, the other
resulting from purely scientifcal in
vestigation, led to the detection and
apprehension Of this Wholesale assas-
sin.
Many surgeon, before the year
1878, would have been glad to know
how it might be possible to amputate
legs and arms without suppuration.
Many tried for solution of the
problem, although most were, no
doubt, content to take things as they
found them, welcome the appearance
of their 'laudable pus, and fight the,
to them, inevitable "hospital fever. y
1t was Joseph Lister, whose name IS
now known to every surgical ward in