New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1915-06-20
Typhus Kills 80 Per Cent of
Population, and Two New
York Doctors Were Vic
tims-Cholera Now Adds
to Wars Horrors.

How are the American surgeons
sanitation experts and nurses progress
ing in the fight against typhus in
Serbia? Have conditions improved to
any extent since our Red Cross work
ers took up the battle?"
Mrs. William X. Draper, secretary of
the New York Chapter of the Ameri-
can Red Cross, Of whom the questions
were asked, slipped an elastic band
from q bundle Of papers on her desk
in the Red Cross Offices, at 100 East
Twenty Street, and extracted a
letter.
Here" she said, as something l
received this morning. II was written
by Miss Emily Simmonds. a graduate
nurse Of Roosevelt Hospital, in this
city, who is at Valjevo, in Serbia. 1t
conveys a fair idea Of what conditions
are in the typhus hospitals"
In part. the grewsOme document
read:
"Here in valjevo the mortality Of
the population from typhus is esti-
mated at 80 per cent and three-fourths
have contracted it, but now 1t seems to
be on the wane, and we are busy clean
ing up the hospitals, or what do duty
as such.
81 am stationed in a school which Is
really meant TO be the surgical hos
pital for the town. There is accom-
modaticn for about $50 wounded, but
for weeks we have had as many as
500, sometimes more, two in one bed
and ever so many lying in their clothes,
Just as they came from the field, on the
floor, with a little straw for q pillow
and no blanket, fifty in room that
should certainly not accommodate more
than twenty. 1t is not at all uncom-
mon, when making rounds, to find that
one man has breathed his last and the
others lying on either side knowing
nothing about it
Hands and Feet Drop Of.
When we first came here there were
only three doctors on their feet. One
of them was our director, who had
] 500 patients to look after all by him.
self. He seemed very much relieved
when we said we would take charge
Of the dressing room. We started with
can of lysol, getting everything
scrubbed. found two small sterilizers
in a corner, which no one had ever
thought Of using, and got them work
ing, one for instruments and the othe
for dressings, and now everything is IN
fine shape.
1--WE do the most fearsome dressings,
mostly gangrenous hands and feet,
which are simply dropping of, and no
one here TO amputate them. | had one
poor man with both feet gangrened
past the ankle and both hands drop
ping off, and still he lives and is hop
ing every day will come his turn to
be sent to Nish TO be operated upon
about two days and two nights jour
new in a Red Cross train! Poor thing,
he was so grateful when ! held ciga-
rette for him so he could smoke it.
sometimes wish could screw up
enough courage TO take them off my
self. have done a few fingers and
toes and am now quite an expert at
incisions; these latter with very blunt
knifel
$50 many Of the men here have sup
curative parotitis, as a complication OF
typhus suppose. 1t does seem shame
70 let them suffer indefinitely, so ! just
90 ahead and do them. | am sending
you q snapshot Miss Sandes took Of the
very first operation I performed. This
man Is well now and has Joined the
firing line again. He hadn't slept for
nearly two weeks, and ] took nearly
half pint of pus from both sides Of
his face.
Flies Are a Pest.
81 am inclosing you a snapshot Of a
sight we used 70 see daily from the
dressing room window. All the collins
were put in a row, and in front of each
coffin was a stretcher with a dead man
living, fully dressed, with little wooden
crosses at the foot Of each with his
name and regiment on IT, The priest
came and chanted the service, and then
they were put in collins and left there
for hours.
ave had a barber in last week for
the first time. He had to be com
Wandered under martial law, as he
wouldn't come on account Of the ty-
phus. Some of the mems hair was at
feast six inches long and full OF YER
min. Now they all look bsldheaded
Next week we hope 70 get bathroom
going and have every new patient
bathed and his hair cut before being
admitted.
Every hospital has had a zinc bath
tub sent up from Nish, but we are very
short Of soap, so we make up with
lysol. And then bed linen is another
proposition. We have only enough 10
give one sheet TO each bed, and this