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- Feb 5, 2017
Such an odd story - he was enlisted for ONE day, and lost his leg the next day.
If there is one thing the American Civil War is known for, it's the over 60,000 amputations that were the direct result of fast-evolving military technology. With such a sudden and large boom of veterans missing limbs, the need for a prosthetic limb industry became vastly apparent. Prosthetics at the time were more for visual appeal rather than practical use. They were large, clunky, hard to use and manipulate, and could be frightening looking to those who were not used to seeing them. James Edward Hanger sought to change not only the public perception of amputees, but the artificial limbs they were provided with as well.
Hanger enlisted on June 2, 1861, and the very next day a Union cannonball came barreling through the stable he was standing in and completely shattered his left leg below the knee and his leg was amputated about 7 inches below the hip.
After many weeks of recovery, he was sent to the Union prison at Camp Chase in Ohio. Later that summer the Union and Confederacy conducted a prisoner of war exchange and he was reunited with his family in Virginia. Being an engineer in his daily life, James Hanger set out to design and construct his artificial leg. His leg design was so efficient that he patented the limb in 1871 and went on to establish the Hanger Clinic, which to this day makes state-of-the-art artificial limbs and mobility aids.
Image credit: Amplitude Magazine, American Battlefield Trust, and National Museum of Civil War Medicine
If there is one thing the American Civil War is known for, it's the over 60,000 amputations that were the direct result of fast-evolving military technology. With such a sudden and large boom of veterans missing limbs, the need for a prosthetic limb industry became vastly apparent. Prosthetics at the time were more for visual appeal rather than practical use. They were large, clunky, hard to use and manipulate, and could be frightening looking to those who were not used to seeing them. James Edward Hanger sought to change not only the public perception of amputees, but the artificial limbs they were provided with as well.
Hanger enlisted on June 2, 1861, and the very next day a Union cannonball came barreling through the stable he was standing in and completely shattered his left leg below the knee and his leg was amputated about 7 inches below the hip.
After many weeks of recovery, he was sent to the Union prison at Camp Chase in Ohio. Later that summer the Union and Confederacy conducted a prisoner of war exchange and he was reunited with his family in Virginia. Being an engineer in his daily life, James Hanger set out to design and construct his artificial leg. His leg design was so efficient that he patented the limb in 1871 and went on to establish the Hanger Clinic, which to this day makes state-of-the-art artificial limbs and mobility aids.
Image credit: Amplitude Magazine, American Battlefield Trust, and National Museum of Civil War Medicine
Bringing the