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- Feb 5, 2017
Walt Whitman wrote an article for the New York Times in 1863 about "The Great Army of the Sick." It was so well-received that he wrote a second one, three weeks later for the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, called "Life Among Fifty Thousand Soldiers." He geared it specifically to hometown readers who recognized him and who would recognize the names of the soldiers he put in the article.
He concluded the article with an angry dig at a particular annoying ward master he had encounter recently on his rounds. "Some pompous and every way improper persons, of course, get power in hospitals, have full spring over the helpless soldiers," he wrote. "There is great state kept at Judiciary-square hospital, for instance. An individual who probably has been waiter somewhere for years past has got into the high and mighty position of sergeant-of-arms at this hospital; he is called "Red Stripe' (for his artillery trimmings) by the patients, of whom he is at the same time the tyrant and the laughing-stock. Going in to call on some sick New York soldiers here the other afternoon, I was stopped and treated to a specimen of the airs of the powerful officer. Surely the Government would do better to send such able-bodied loafers down into service in front, where they could earn their rations, than keep them here in the idle and shallow sinecures of the military guard over a collection of sick soldiers to give insolence to their visitors and friends.
The problem with Red Stripe was not an isolated one; the system was as much to blame as the individual. Few rational men—sick or wel—wanted to be in the hospitals. nevertheless, military doctrine mandated that a certain number of soldiers be detailed to the hospitals as attendants. Some were drawn from nearby garrisons—generally the most expendable soldiers. These shiftless, surly, and often simple-minded individuals were joined by convalescent soldiers and invalids who proved physically and emotionally unable to meet the challenges confronting them in the wards. The male attendants, who outnumbered female nurses by a margin of five or six to one, were noticeably illsuited for the job. They balked at doing "women's work," shirked their cleaning duties, mishandled patients (or ignored them altogether), and were fumble-fingered when assisting at surgery. Civilians hired to augment their numbers were even worse. They were universally regarded as "a filthy, saucy lot," and they frequently augmented their salaries of $20.50 a month by stealing from patients or sellling them extra doses of morphine.
Given such undertrained and unmotivated attendants, it is not surprising that mistakes were made—sometimes fatally—in the treatment of patients. Whitman was on hand for the tragicomic denouement of one such incident. On January 4, 1863 at Campbell Hospital, a middle-aged private named Joshua Ford, of Company E, 1st Delaware Regiment, was orally given a fatal dose of ammonia nitrate that had been intended for use as a foot wash. He lingered for nine days before dying and seemed to take the mishap with amazing aplomb, helped no doubt the liberal libation of rum and water that the attending physician permitted him. "Now give me another plug of tobacco—I'm going to die soon," he would say, or, "Now give me some more toddy,". A childless widower, Ford "did not seem to mind death at all—took it very phlegmatically—spoke of it with perfect coolness,"" Whitman observed. He died early on the morning of January 13 after taking a last lingering drink of rum and water. Another soldier, Private Frederick Huse of the 35th Massachusetts, was accidentally given an overdose of opium and laudanum by the same "ignorant war master" and died a short time later as well.
This is all from "The Better Angel: Walt Whitman In The Civil War" by Roy Morris, Jr.
So Mercy Street with a mean and ignorant Hospital Steward was right. There are lots more examples in the book.
He concluded the article with an angry dig at a particular annoying ward master he had encounter recently on his rounds. "Some pompous and every way improper persons, of course, get power in hospitals, have full spring over the helpless soldiers," he wrote. "There is great state kept at Judiciary-square hospital, for instance. An individual who probably has been waiter somewhere for years past has got into the high and mighty position of sergeant-of-arms at this hospital; he is called "Red Stripe' (for his artillery trimmings) by the patients, of whom he is at the same time the tyrant and the laughing-stock. Going in to call on some sick New York soldiers here the other afternoon, I was stopped and treated to a specimen of the airs of the powerful officer. Surely the Government would do better to send such able-bodied loafers down into service in front, where they could earn their rations, than keep them here in the idle and shallow sinecures of the military guard over a collection of sick soldiers to give insolence to their visitors and friends.
The problem with Red Stripe was not an isolated one; the system was as much to blame as the individual. Few rational men—sick or wel—wanted to be in the hospitals. nevertheless, military doctrine mandated that a certain number of soldiers be detailed to the hospitals as attendants. Some were drawn from nearby garrisons—generally the most expendable soldiers. These shiftless, surly, and often simple-minded individuals were joined by convalescent soldiers and invalids who proved physically and emotionally unable to meet the challenges confronting them in the wards. The male attendants, who outnumbered female nurses by a margin of five or six to one, were noticeably illsuited for the job. They balked at doing "women's work," shirked their cleaning duties, mishandled patients (or ignored them altogether), and were fumble-fingered when assisting at surgery. Civilians hired to augment their numbers were even worse. They were universally regarded as "a filthy, saucy lot," and they frequently augmented their salaries of $20.50 a month by stealing from patients or sellling them extra doses of morphine.
Given such undertrained and unmotivated attendants, it is not surprising that mistakes were made—sometimes fatally—in the treatment of patients. Whitman was on hand for the tragicomic denouement of one such incident. On January 4, 1863 at Campbell Hospital, a middle-aged private named Joshua Ford, of Company E, 1st Delaware Regiment, was orally given a fatal dose of ammonia nitrate that had been intended for use as a foot wash. He lingered for nine days before dying and seemed to take the mishap with amazing aplomb, helped no doubt the liberal libation of rum and water that the attending physician permitted him. "Now give me another plug of tobacco—I'm going to die soon," he would say, or, "Now give me some more toddy,". A childless widower, Ford "did not seem to mind death at all—took it very phlegmatically—spoke of it with perfect coolness,"" Whitman observed. He died early on the morning of January 13 after taking a last lingering drink of rum and water. Another soldier, Private Frederick Huse of the 35th Massachusetts, was accidentally given an overdose of opium and laudanum by the same "ignorant war master" and died a short time later as well.
This is all from "The Better Angel: Walt Whitman In The Civil War" by Roy Morris, Jr.
So Mercy Street with a mean and ignorant Hospital Steward was right. There are lots more examples in the book.
Bringing the