63: Wounded and Dying: Nurses, Doctors, and Disease in the Civil War

History That Doesn't Suck

ProfGregJackson

Education, History, Society & Culture

4.5 • 5.1K Ratings

🗓️ 27 April 2020

⏱️ 65 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

“I had never severed the nerves and fibers of human flesh.” This is the story of Civil War medicine. At the start of the war, the wounded sometimes lay on the field of battle for days hoping for help. Some die slowly and painfully from exposure and thirst. Others are robbed as their life expires. The divided nation has new, deadlier guns, but medical treatment has changed. It’s a deadly combination. Both sides step up. The Union’s new “Ambulance Corps” sets a new standard for battlefield first aid as the newly created US Sanitary Commission improves policy. The CSA’s “Infirmary Corps” and regional organizations make similar improvements. North and South, women save countless soldiers as they enter a new medical profession: “nursing.” But most surgeons don’t believe “refied ladies” should be working in this professional role. Some intentionally make life downright miserable for these female patriots. Luckily for the wounded, these women don’t break easily. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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0:33.0	seriously researched hard-hitting survey of American history through entertaining stories.
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1:07.0	Welcome to History that doesn't suck.
1:09.0	I'm your professor, Greg Jackson, and I'd like to tell you a story.
1:15.0	It's September 17, 1862, and American men are dying by the thousands.
1:23.0	Yeah, you likely remember this Maryland-based battle from episode 52.
1:28.0	It's the Battle of Antietam, or Sharpsburg.
1:31.0	The name all depends on which side of the mace and dicks in line you call home.
1:35.0	Regardless of what you call it, though, one thing remains indisputable.
1:39.0	It's the bloodiest day in American history.
1:43.0	Blood flows on the battlefield as 300 horse-drawn ambulances from the newly created ambulance corps transport wounded soldiers to nearby field hospitals.
1:54.0	But don't put too much stock in the term hospitals.
1:57.0	There merely common-deered buildings where poorly supplied and understaffed surgeons desperately try to save soldiers' lives.
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