It is now six days
since I resumed the charge of the hygiene of the camp. My first work was to
have my tent struck and removed from the ground, that the spot on which it
stood might be thoroughly sunned and cleaned. I then had the whole sprinkled
with disinfectants. Have daily visited every tent since, to see that it was
ventilated, by having the bottoms turned up for an hour or two, and that it was
well cleaned. The result has been most striking. The sick list has already, in
only six days, decreased fifty in number, though the seeds of typhus, sown some
time since, still sprout, and occasionally give us serious trouble. Another
trouble is off of my hands to-day. I have got a settlement with our Quartermaster,
the first I have been able to get since the organization of the regiment. On
settlement, I find my hospital fund to amount to one hundred and forty dollars.
This sum, above the regular rations, will buy all the comforts my sick need,
and will relieve the Sanitary Commission and our friends at home from the
expense and trouble of providing those things for us. Nor will this be only
temporary, for I find that I can, by good economy, after providing well for all
the wants of the sick, still have a surplus of from fifteen to fifty dollars a
month, to spare to general hospitals, or to the new regiments who have been
less fortunate in providing a fund for this purpose.
SOURCE: Alfred L.
Castleman, The Army of the Potomac. Behind the Scenes. A Diary of
Unwritten History; From the Organization of the Army, by General George B.
McClellan, to the close of the Campaign in Virginia about the First Day
January, 1863, p. 60
No comments:
Post a Comment