The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1900-06-02
SURGEON ON
BOER WAR
acts of the Field and
Hospital.
HIGH PRAISE FOR NURSES
Sir William MacCormac, Back From
South Africa, Speaks of
Medical Affairs.

N' 'iio eHiinent surgeon, has come
BACK from South Africa and gives an in
teres'ihs account of his experiences
among the wounded at the front. He has
nothing but praise for the medical ar
engagements of the war THE provision
made by the Government" he saws. "was
so ample and complete that it left little
OF nothing to be desired Nothing that
provision could suggest or that money
could purchase was wanting anywhere >,
Inc nursing staff also gets high praisa
especially the Sisters of the Army Nurs-
ing Service, but the famous surgeon al
lows himself to say of another class. mora
chartably, by the way. than others at
nome have already spoken of them: ..Tba
work has undoubtedly been hampered in
some cases by the interference of ladies
VINO know little of hospitals or nurses
ana who wish with the best intentions
10 help. but their inexperience renders
tnem ineffective for good" Speaking of
hospltal trains, which have been so ex
tensiveiy used during the present war.
and have been fitted up in the most per
tect manner. Sir William declares their
value to have been incalculable.
In some cases." he says, by reason of
the situation, they have been able actual
ly to go on to the field of battle itself
one Illustration of the value of these was
found after the battle of Colenso. where
men wounded in battle in the MORNING
WERE as result of these hospital trains
resting in their beds In a covered buiId-
ing before in the afternoon, after bav-
ing been conveyed some forty miles. One
of the most noteworthy things in this
" iG ha
have been picked off the field. In the
wounded often lay where they fell for
Gays and nights, but / do not suppose
there mas been single battle in this war
IN Whlch the wounded remained on the
held for twenty-four hours"
Another question on which there has
Deeh inuch discussion here is the value of
lhoculatlon against enteric fever. Ac-
cordlng to Sir William, mo decided opn-
ION can yet be given on this point since
there are not yet sufficient data for sta
tistics. The observations made seem to
show that those inoculated are less apt
t 70 tahe the disease or, if they, are at
lacked, they nave it in a mllder form
but the question is still sub JUDGE"
with regard to the general question of
wounds ana mortality, Sir William Mac
Cormac bears out the testimony of other
observers as to the humaneness of the
Mauser and Lee-Metford bullet At the
same time he considers them both as
suflciently stopping missiles in civilized
warfare. Speaking generally, he found
the wounds inflicted by the Mauser and
Lee Metford to be very similar and both
much less fatal than the larger proiec-
tlies used In former wars. AS many as
80 per cent OF the cases in the general
base hospitals recovered and were dis
charged, very large proportion being
able TO return to duty at the front He
says:
III he head, chest and abdomen NAV be
and are, traversed without infiicting NOR
tai injury, and in considerable proper
ton OF cases without inflicting perma-
rapid healing of the external wound is
remarkable: 1t rapidly closes under a
black scab. This characteristic of
injured Msdndf by in the the Ma Gssss bS Of
let did not differ in any material de-
gree in the wounds inflicted by the Lee
Metford bullet on the wounded Beers
whom L saw at Jacobsdal. Yet a good
many or these wounds were suppura ting,
and as the difference between the two
bullets is so slight, the difference in re-
suits must, ] believe, be ascribed to a
large extent to the fact that our wound
ed have been treated so speedily after
the receipt of their injuries with the first
held dressing on the field. In one of my
previous letters | commented upon the
careful and effective manner in which the
wounded on their arrival a the first field
hospitals were found to have been dress
ed. the British soldier has been well
Medical Corps upon the method of appli-
cation of the first field dressing, which
eacn man carries on his person, and
judging by the way in which these dress
ings were applied by the men themselves
or by comrades in the absence of the
medical officer, their teaching appears to
have been by no means ineffective, and
the good results are very appreciable.
"One finds case after case convalescent
after bullet has traversed the lung and
in many instances both lungs. The heart
and pericardium have so often been
found to lie in the track of the bullet
that it seems probable that these highly
vulnerable structures must in several
Instances have been actually pierced In
a few cases both the abdomen and the
thorax have been traversed by the same
projectile without serious inconvenience
to the patient.
II have seen some cases of successful
laparotomy and many more l know of
have been unsuccessful: the injury has
been irreparable in many. In many too
long an interval had elapsed and there
were other unavoidable hindrances. Be
this as 1t may, / feel sure that the mere
fact of a Mauser or Lee Metford rifle
bullet traversing the abdomen is of itself
no sufficient indication of the necessity
for abdominal exploration or operation.
i have seen so many cases of this kind
in which the patients have recovered
without any surgical interference that
one may well pause before deciding to
expose wounded man to the inevitable
risks attending such an exploration"
With regard to the stopping power of
these modern rifle bullets, Sir William
says: There is no doubt that a man
may receive flesh wound in any part of
his body and be thereby none the worse
for many hours. He can carry on for a
certain time even after receiving a chest
wound or a gunshot fracture of the up
per extremity, but with these and one or
two other exceptions his fighting capac-
ity after being wounded is racticary
nil In war like this there is no such
thing a rush of a body of men on
either side. Although one has seen cases
of men being able to advance for a GER
tain distance after having been shot
through the body, as a rule they suffered
from immediate faintness and sickness,
and would have been very little disposed
for further action. In savage warfare
men might be capable of a short rush or
charge after these wounds, but GER
tainly could not do much under modern
conditions with a distance of perhaps one
thousand yards to cover before coming
upon the enemy"
In all the cases that came under his
observation, Sir William says: II never
came across a wound caused by dunn
dunn bullet. AS regards the effect of
lyddite, some German officers who were
with the enemy said that the Beers car
ried with them bottles of vinegar to min
imize its effects, and that those who did
not adopt this precaution suffered for
weeks from nausea Even outside the