Medical recollections of the Army of the Potomac / by Jonathan Letterman.

  • Jonathan Letterman
Date:
1866
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Medical recollections of the Army of the Potomac / by Jonathan Letterman. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    submitted so cheerfully to the orders of the command- ing General, and endured the sufferings which, for the sake of the country, those orders of necessity entailed. This marching and fighting in such a region, in such weather, with lack of food, want of rest, great excite- ment, and the depression necessarily consequent upon it, could have no other effect than that of greatly in- creasing the numbers of sick after the army reached Harrison’s Landing. Scurvy existed in the army when it reached this point. The seeds had doubtless been planted by want of vegetables, exposure to cold and wet, working and sleeping in the mud and rain, and the inexperience of the troops in taking proper care of themselves under difficult circumstances. This disease is not to be dreaded merely for the numbers it sends upon the Reports of Sick : the evil goes much further, and the causes which give rise to it undermine the strength, depress the spirits, take away the courage and elasticity of those who do not report themselves sick, and who yet are not well. They do not feel sick, and yet their energy, their powers of endurance, and their willingness to undergo hardship, are in a great degree gone, and they know not why. In this way the fighting strength of the army was affected to a much greater degree than was indicated by the num- ber of those who reported sick. All these hardships reacted upon the Medical officers in common with the
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