BlueGin
Diamond Member
- Jul 10, 2004
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Interesting read. Particularly how little they knew at the time and to also learn where the concept of the ambulance service began.
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GETTYSBURG, Pa. (AP) As gunshots ravaged the bodies of tens of thousands of soldiers at the Battle of Gettysburg, military doctors responded with a method of treatment that is still the foundation of combat medicine today.
Union Army Maj. Dr. Jonathan Letterman is remembered as the father of battlefield medicine for his Civil War innovations. He realized that organizing the medical corps was a key for any battle.
"For military medicine, in particular, the lessons that Letterman gave us are as true today as they were then," said retired Lt. Gen. Ronald Ray Blanck, the former surgeon general for the U.S. Army.
Before the war, medical supplies were handled by regular quartermaster wagons, Blanck said, meaning they had to compete with "beans and bullets."
The situation was so bad that, in some early Civil War battles, the wounded were left on the field for days, subject to the mercy of untrained troops and civilians.
Gettysburg offers lessons on battlefield medicine
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GETTYSBURG, Pa. (AP) As gunshots ravaged the bodies of tens of thousands of soldiers at the Battle of Gettysburg, military doctors responded with a method of treatment that is still the foundation of combat medicine today.
Union Army Maj. Dr. Jonathan Letterman is remembered as the father of battlefield medicine for his Civil War innovations. He realized that organizing the medical corps was a key for any battle.
"For military medicine, in particular, the lessons that Letterman gave us are as true today as they were then," said retired Lt. Gen. Ronald Ray Blanck, the former surgeon general for the U.S. Army.
Before the war, medical supplies were handled by regular quartermaster wagons, Blanck said, meaning they had to compete with "beans and bullets."
The situation was so bad that, in some early Civil War battles, the wounded were left on the field for days, subject to the mercy of untrained troops and civilians.
Gettysburg offers lessons on battlefield medicine
