The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1900-07-09

one half having been sent in another d.
| rection, leaving this hospital with half its
equipment and staff. 1t should Consequent
| ly have accommodates fifty patients. On
| my first visit to 1t april 81 there were $50
| in it's tents. ninety OF whom were typhoid
cases 1t was in such condition OF
crowding insufficient equipment, and gen.
eral misery that / hesitated to describe 1t
| in my last letter. hoping for a speedy i'm
provement which the authorities promised.
| More than a fortnight later another visit
disclosed the following state OF things:
| With no further equipment than two mar
quees and few bell tents, no addition to
staff or anything else. there were 316 pa
| TENTS, of whom half were typhoids. Their
| condition was almost indescribable. The
| tents were bell tents, such as were men
| toned in a former letter as affordng
sleeping accommodation for from six to
eight orderlies when working and in sound
| health. In many of these tents there were
| ten typhoid cases lying closely packed to-
| gether, the dying against the GONZALES
| cent, the man in his crisis" pressed
| against the man Fastening to it.
There was not room to step between
| them. Think Of this, you who know the
sort of nursing typhoid patient requires.
With no beds or mattresses, and only for
ty-two stretchers in the whole hospital. 1t
followed that 274 patients had to be on the
earth. There was a great scarcity OF
blankets and no patient could have more
| than one, with a waterproof sheet between
his body and the ground. The ground is
| hard as stone, and at night the tempera-
ture falls to freezing point. Besides other
deficiencies which cannot be described,
there were no sheets or pillowcases or
pretence Of bed linen of any kind; only
the coarse rug grated against the sensitive
skin burning with fever. The heat of
these tents in the midday sun was over
towering, their doors sickening.
Men lay with their faces covered with
flies in black clusters, too weak to raise
hand to brush them off, trying in vain
to dislodge them by painful twitching of
the features. There was no one to do It
for them.
JelIrfous Patients Unattended.
Seventeen orderlies had come with, or
been raised for, the half-section of the field
hospital: ten had been taken from 1t, the
number being made up from the beai er
company; but they had other duties to ger
form than brushing flies of patients faces.
At night there were not enough to prevent
those in the delirious stage from gett ng
up and wandering about the camp half
naked in the bitter cold. In one tent
where some slept and others lay with eyes
open and staring, a case OF "perforation"
was groaning out his life huddled against |
his neighbor on the ground. Men had not |
only to see. but often to feel, others dis.
There Is no need to pile on the agony, |
but worse remains behind which must b. |
told. Therefore / will pass over an Incl |
dental visit to the hospital after a heavy |
rain. when many Of tine patients-:yploid |
had increased-were to be seen lying three |
inches deep In mud, and come TO my last |
visit, four days ago, on my way down to
the front. The chief medical ofilcer had |
been changed; from all reports this one
was as painstaking as the last. He told me
that one time his patients had increased to
1876! Three hundred of these were typho.ds. 1
The few trained orderlies had been most
ly taken away; in their place were twenty
five unframed and ignorant privates from
an infantry regiment. most of whom were
themselves ''convalescents. to do the
whole Of the nursing. The medical san
remained always at three. Let the man
ual'' throw its own light on this. The pa
TENTS here were within twenty-four of the
number $500 allotted to a general hospital
general hospital has 20 medical men, rs
trained nursing orderlies, q unframed Iri-
Yates, and nurses. The sick require far
more attention and nursing than the |
wounded; the general hospitals at Cape
Town. equipped as above. we're mostly oc-
cupied by wounded. Here was this hospital
crowded with typhoid left to three doctors,
twenty-five unframed privates, and no
nurses.
The Grnvest Incident.
With one more incident graver than all
the rest the dark history Of field hos
pital at Bloernfontein must close. On the
occasion of my last visit the hospital had
been mostly emptied, as it was to move
to the front. In the course of this process
twenty OF the worst cases were removed
to a more permanent hospital mile and
u half off How were they taken? They
were lifted out Of their tents and put into
rough OK wagons-all typhoids and many
of them dangerously il-rand then jolted
across the veldt. which in this place is
much broken by spruits and gullies. One
case was in a state of "hemorrhage'' when
moved. The order had come to evacuate
the hospital; the medical officer had no
choice but to obey; there were no ambu
lances- In three days four of these
twenty were dead men.
1t must be remembered that these events
occurred a. Bloemfontein, and mainly dur
Ing the second month OF its. occupation by
our army. The town had always been
marked down as our advanced military
base. and from the day We entered ii be- |
came, what IL will never cease to be, a
British stronghold. The strategic condi-
lions surrounding the scenes described
must. therefore, be clearly differentiated
from those which attend a continuous |
march, in order that we should not be-
misled by talk about military exigencies"
and the like. No practical man will ques-
ton the prior claim OF military exigency {
over humanity where the interests of the
two are lrreconcilable; but whenever the
former is not really endangered by the
latter humanity cannot, and must not, be t
entirely neglected.
This raises a question OF policy, apart
from and above that of the disorganiza- |
ton Of a medical system. II need not be I
discussed here; but in the writer's opinion l
there were no military e2igencies really I
involved that could necessitate, there 1
were none so pressing that they can ex- I
cuse. the suffering and horrors to which I
our sick and wounded were subjected at
this time and place To relieve these, and {
others which must be related, there were
certain obvious methods. none Of which
could have seriously interfered with mill
tary exigencies.
HIS SUICIDE A MYSTERY. +,