Brother Against Microbe

The link worked fine for me.

While I feel I knew most of what was written, I was surprised to find that over 8% of federal troops contracted venereal disease during the war. I guess soldiering wasn't so lonely after all
 
Brother Against Microbe
By TERRY L. JONES
OCTOBER 26, 2012



On Oct. 27, 1862, the Confederate cavalry commander Jo Shelby filed a report on his brigade’s recent operations in Missouri. The colonel concluded with a sobering assessment of his troopers’ physical condition. “Our men, from being so poorly clad, and owing to the excessive duties that they have been compelled to perform, are rapidly becoming unfit for service,” he wrote. “Our brigade reports now some 500 sick. We have a great many men without a blanket, overcoat, shoes, or socks.” When the brigade was first organized, he went on, it numbered 2,319 men, and “the greater portion were reported for duty until within the last few days. Since this cold spell of weather set in, our reports show but 1,068 men for duty. The increase in sickness in Jeans’ and Gordon’s regiments is 100 per day.”

Colonel Shelby’s command was not unique. Measles, mumps, pneumonia, influenza and other maladies often put entire regiments out of action. In August 1861, 645 out of 920 men in the 7th Louisiana suffered an illness serious enough for them to be listed on the regiment’s hospital ledger. The Civil War may have been a fight of brother against brother, but it was equally a fight of brother against microbe.

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At the time, medical practice was divided into several competing systems. Physicians believed the body had four “humors”: blood, yellow bile, black bile and phlegm. Most diseases were thought to be caused by the humors getting out of balance; it was necessary to purge the patient of a particular humor so the body could heal itself. Those who might be described as orthodox physicians practiced “heroic therapy.” This included bloodletting and the use of strong drugs and enemas containing toxic agents to remove the harmful humors.


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Strange, I never had any problems with the links.

During the Civil War, at least 185,000 soldiers died in battle and 435,000 died from disease and other noncombat causes, for a ratio of about 1:2. The ratio was approximately 1:7 for the Mexican War and 1:5 for the Spanish-American War. Despite the primitive state of Civil War medicine, it appears the men received the best medical care of any American soldiers of the 19th century.


The last bit of the article stands out for me know that it is on the thread itself. I am in no way qualified to debate medical history and am inclined to wonder if total war (or at least massive amounts of troops in uniform) allowed for more doctors and resources to be made available for the men. However, I am wondering if the low rate of disease related deaths in the Civil War as compared to the Mexican and Spanish-American Wars may have been related to the fact that the bulk of the Civil War was fought in more hospitable and (for many troops) more familiar climates, while troops sent abroad in '46 and '98 went to alien climates great distances from home. I can speak from personal experience that even today foreign travel can take its toll.
 
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