The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1903-11-16

promptly and energetically acted upon. The
first important development I'm this
case was the lamentable want of
hospital accommoda lions for such an emer-
gency. We have the excellent st. Vim
cent Hospital, built, equipped and managed
by the CHARACTERISTIC enterprise and beney-
oience OF the Catholic Church. yet equally
open to men and women of any religious
or no religious belief. and which has for
many years furnished relief to sick and
wounded strangers, and to which some or
the wounded in this calamity were taken.
We have also the very excellent Deacon
ess Home. built, equipped and managed by
the Lutheran Church. one of the smallest
as one of the best churches In the city.
but neither of these, or both combined,
were sufficient for the demands of such
an emergency, having hardly sufficient
pacity for the ordinary daily demands for
such Christian sympathy and aid as ought
10 be found In every city. AS a result.
most of the wounded and dying had to be
sent to the City Hospital. place as nearly
untitled for such purpose can well be
imagined, and IL is reflection upon the
present management or upon the city that
this is While il might be, and ought
to be, greatly improved both in its capacity
and appointments and in its management,
adapted to the constant demand for refuge.
If a stranger is taken suddenly i'll at a
hotel or in the case of people mangled by
railroad disaster, not to mention the
hundreds of homeless boarders who are
liable to need such attention as no sick
man woman can receive at a hotel
boarding house The necessity for such a
hospital has long been felt by the humane,
even in the everyday experiences of the city,
and hence the st. Vincent and the Dea-
coness Home, which can only in part meet
the ordinary demands. The City Hospital
is rightly intended only for the treatment
of the thousand-and-one cases of wounds
received In drunken ARRAYS, or saloon stab
bings, or other woundings of home people
from one cause or another hardly pre-
tending to offer refuge for the homeless
sick who need attention which they can
not receive at their temporary quarters.
Not to lay stress upon the fact that so
large per cent. of the patients at the
City Hospital is unavoidably from the
criminal and rowdy classes. the fact that
1t is considered a place for political work.
ers and place where prentice saw-bones
may practice, rather than field for ex-
perienced and skillful physicians and sur
geonS, is against its being a suitable place
for the unfortunate stranger who has
claim upon our Christian hospitality. The
lesson, therefore, which above all other les
Is the immediate and imperative demand
for another and larger private hospital
l do not undertake to say how this is to be
procured. 1t is the demand 1 wish to
phasize, and 1t is not for the stranger only
that plead. There are more than a dozen
men of wealth who are esteemed citizens
now boarding at hotels. who may need just
such nursing as they can now receive only
at the St. Vincent or the Deaconess Home,
or at some small private sanatorium pri-
marlly intended for patients to be treated
ton, who could make no better disposition
of few thousand of their dollars than to
help build and equip a hospital whose ben
efits they may themselves need at no very
remote day. But not these alone, but hun
dreds of others who would feel honored and
profited to entertain the Master may do 1t
by making provisions to entertain sick
strangers in a suitable hospital, and the
wisest cannot foresee how near to his own
home this needy one may be. One of the
best and richest and most useful men of
early Indiana died in the county poorhouse
less than fifty years ago for want of a bet
ter hospital to die in Death had swept all
his immediate family away, business
verses had made him poor and there was no
one to minister to his wants but the keeper
of a very poor poorhouse.
While / do not indicate the details of
such a work / may be pardoned for sug
costing that, in some way. the Protestant
churches of the city not already represented
In some hospital might or ought to unite In
building and equipping a hospital at least
equal to the st. Vincent. Protestants are
welcomed there and are treated well. Can
we not emulate their catholicity and Chris
tianity? u. L. SEE.
Indianapolis, Nov. IA.