Surgery on the Battlefield 1860s: Civil War
Civil War Surgery Enactment: Willowbrook, Newfield, Maine
Assistant surgeon Scroggins, dressed in the typical, blue woolen Union uniform of the U.S. Civil War, with a clean surgeon's apron, described the treatment wounded soldiers generally received as well as battlefield medical treatment in general.
Scroggins is a member of the Third Maine. Members of this volunteer infantry fastidiously research and re-enact life during the Civil War years of America.
This particular enactment was held at Willowbrook Museum, Newfield, Maine (September 13, 2008). Willowbrook is a picturesque, pastoral relic of an 1800's, rural Maine community.
Wounded Soldiers
The first MASH (Mobile Army Surgical Hospitals) units were developed during the Civil War. The severity of a soldier's wounds were assessed as fatal or treatable. If assessed as fatal (usually head, chest or abdomen wounds), the soldier was placed to the side and made as comfortable as possible with the medicines of the day, until his life was finished. If the wound(s) were assessed as treatable, the soldier would be attended to as quickly as the surgeon was able to tend to him.
Though medical professionals of that time knew wounds healed better in clean conditions, they were not as aware of germs as they are today. Scroggins explained that the surgery table was not cleaned as a rule between soldiers, until it became so bloody the patient was in danger of sliding off. Surgical tools were "washed" off in buckets of bloody water left over from the previous patients. Water buckets were refilled only when absolutely necessary.
Amputations
Soldiers generally had access to anesthesia before amputation. Ether and chloroform were the anesthetics of the day. Scroggins described a cone shaped devise, like a funnel, was placed over the mouth and nose of the patient. In the top (narrow) section of the cone/funnel, was a cloth/sponge upon which drops of chloroform were applied. Soldiers were awake and aware of the surgery, but they did not feel pain. The images the public has of soldiers biting down on sticks and bracing against waves of screeching pain are creative imagery and not generally true.
Whiskey was generally administered first to ward off shock. At the time whiskey was accepted as a stimulant. A scalpel was used to cut into the skin and roll it back. A Lister knife or Catlin double-edged knife was used to cut through the muscle mass to the bone. Using a retractor, muscle mass was slid back, exposing the bone. A saw, looking something like a hack saw, cut off the limb and gnawing forceps smoothed the rough edges of bone. The pulled back muscle mass was released.
Major veins were tied off utilizing sterilized horse hair. The sterilization was not for the prevention of germs, but heating the horsehair made it more pliable. Surgeons, according to Scroggins, noticed that wounds healed without infection when this method was used.
Finally, the skin was rolled back and sutured. Post-op morphine or opium was administered as soon as possible. The patient was moved to a more permanent field or general hospital, then sent home by, "rail or sail," Scroggins added. Treatment was hopefully administered within the first 48 hours of the wound. Survival chances were greatly reduced after that time period, because sepsis (body's damaging response to infection) generally set in.
Sources
1stcavmedic.com, "Medics A Brief History", no author or date, written for a website.
thirdmaine.com, Company A, Third Maine Regiment Volunteer Infantry
Mary Kathryn Inman, "Surgery", student, University of North Carolina at Pembroke,uncp.edu.,no date
Willowbrook Museum, Newfield, Maine
Scott Scroggins, Surgery Procedures
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Third Maine Preparing for Drills
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