Half a Century Part 24

"No, ma'am! there's no warm water!"

"How many wounded men have you in this hospital?"

"Well, about seven hundred, I believe."

"About seven hundred wounded men, and no warm water! So none of them get anything to eat!"

"Oh, yes! they get plenty to eat."

"And how do you cook without warm water?"

"Why, there's plenty of hot water in the kitchen, but we're not allowed to go there, and we have none in the wards."

"Where is the kitchen?"

He directed me. I covered the wound--told the patient to wait and I would get warm water. In the kitchen a dozen cooks stopped to stare at me, but one gave me what I came for, and on returning to the ward I said to Charlie:

"Now you can have some warm water, if you want it."

"But I do not want it! I like cold water best!"

"Then it is best for you, but it is not best for this man!"

I had never before seen any such wound as the one I was dressing, but I could think of but one way--clean it thoroughly, put on clean lint and rags and bandages, without hurting the patient, and this was very easy to do; but while I did this, I wanted to do something more, viz.: dispel the gloom which hung over that ward. I knew that sick folks should have their minds occupied by pleasant thoughts, and never addressed an audience with more care than I talked to that one man, in appearance, while really talking to all those who lay before me and some to whom my back was turned.

I could modulate my voice so as to be heard at quite a distance, and yet cause no jar to very sensitive nerves close at hand; and when I told my patient that I proposed to punish him now, while he was in my power, all heard and wondered; then every one was stimulated to learn that it was to keep him humble, because, having received such a wound in the charge on Marie's Hill, he would be so proud by and by that common folks would be afraid to speak to him. I should be quite thrown into the shade by his laurels, and should probably take my revenge in advance by sticking pins in him now, when he could not help himself.

This idea proved to be quite amusing, and before I had secured that bandage, the men seemed to have forgotten their wounds, except as a source of future pride, and were firing jokes at each other as rapidly as they had done bullets at the enemy. When, therefore, I proposed sticking pins into any one else who desired such punishment, there was quite a demand for my services, and with my basin of tepid water I started to wet the hard, dry dressings, and leave them to soften before being removed. Before night I discovered that lint is an instrument of incalculable torture, and should never be used, as either blood or pus quickly converts some portion of it into splints, as irritating as a pine shaving.

CHAPTER LIII.

HOSPITAL GANGRENE.

About nine o'clock I returned to the man I had come to help, and found that he still slept. I hoped he might rouse and have some further message for his wife, before death had finished his work, and so remained with him, although I was much needed in the "very bad ward."

I had sat by him but a few moments when I noticed a green shade on his face. It darkened, and his breathing grew labored--then ceased. I think it was not more than twenty minutes from the time I observed the green tinge until he was gone. I called the nurse, who brought the large man I had seen at the door of the bad ward, and now I knew he was a surgeon, knew also, by the sudden shadow on his face when he saw the corpse, that he was alarmed; and when he had given minute directions for the removal of the bed and its contents, the washing of the floor and sprinkling with chloride of lime, I went close to his side, and said in a low voice:

"Doctor, is not this hospital gangrene?"

He looked down at me, seemed to take my measure, and answered:

"I am very sorry to say, madam, that it is."

"Then you want lemons!"

"We would be glad to have them!" "Glad to have them?" I repeated, in profound astonishment, "why, you _must_ have them!"

He seemed surprised at my earnestness, and set about explaining:

"We sent to the Sanitary Commission last week, and got half a box."

"Sanitary Commission, and half a box of lemons? How many wounded have you?"

"Seven hundred and fifty."

"Seven hundred and fifty wounded men! Hospital gangrene, and half a box of lemons!"

"Well, that was all we could get; Government provides none; but our Chaplain is from Boston--his wife has written to friends there and expects a box next week!"

"To Boston for a box of lemons!"

I went to the head nurse whom I had scolded in the morning, who now gave me writing materials, and I wrote a short note to the _New York Tribune_:

"Hospital gangrene has broken out in Washington, and we want lemons!

_lemons!_ LEMONS! ~LEMONS!~ No man or woman in health, has a right to a gla.s.s of lemonade until these men have all they need; send us lemons!"

I signed my name and mailed it immediately, and it appeared next morning. That day Schuyler Colfax sent a box to my lodgings, and five dollars in a note, bidding me send to him if more were wanting; but that day lemons began to pour into Washington, and soon, I think, into every hospital in the land. Gov. Andrews sent two hundred boxes to the Surgeon General. I received so many, that at one time there were twenty ladies, several of them with ambulances, distributing those which came to my address, and if there was any more hospital gangrene that season I neither saw nor heard of it.

The officers in Campbell knew of the letter, and were glad of the supplies it brought, but some time pa.s.sed before they identified the writer as the little sister in the bad ward, who had won the reputation of being the "best wound-dresser in Washington."

CHAPTER LIV.

GET PERMISSION TO WORK.

Rules required me to leave Campbell at five o'clock, but the sun was going down, and I lay on a cot, in the bad ward, feeling that going home, or anywhere else, was impossible, when that large doctor came, felt my pulse, laid his hand on my brow, and said:

"You must not work so hard or we will lose you! I have been hunting for you to ask if you would like to remain with us?"

"Like to remain with you? Well, you will have to send a file of soldiers with fixed bayonets to drive me away."

He laughed quite heartily, and said:

"We do not want you to go away. I am executive officer; Surgeon Kelley and Dr. Baxter, surgeon in charge, has commissioned me to say that if you wish to stay, he will have a room prepared for you. He hunted for you to say so in person, but is gone; now I await your decision. Shall I order you a room?"

"Surgeon Baxter! Why--what does he know about me?"

"Oh, Surgeon Baxter, two medical inspectors, and the surgeon of this ward were present this morning when you came in and took possession."

His black eyes twinkled, and he shook with laughter when I sat up, clasped my hands, and said:

"Oh, dear? Were they the men who were standing around Charlie? Why I had not dreamed of them being surgeons!"

"Did you not know by their shoulders traps?"