f the British army in the Crimea, says that there were "218,952
admissions into hospital."[35] "The general return, showing the primary
admissions into the hospitals of the army in the East, from the 10th
April, 1854, to the 30th June, 1856, gives only 162,123 cases of all
kinds."[36] But another Government Report states the admissions to be
162,073.[37] Miss Nightingale says, "There was, at first, no system of
registration for general hospitals, for all were burdened with work
beyond their strength."[38] Dr. Mann says, that, in the War of 1812, "no
sick-records were found in the hospital at Burlington," one of the
largest depositories of the sick then in the country. "The
hospital-records on the Niagara were under no order."[39] It could
hardly have been otherwise. The regimental hospitals then, as frequently
must be the case in war, were merely extemporized shelters, not
conveniences. They were churches, houses, barns, shops, sheds, or any
building that happened to be within reach, or huts, cabins, or tents
suddenly created for the purpose. In these all the surgeons' time,
energy, and resources were expended in making their patients
comfortable, in defending them from cold and storm, or from suffering in
their crowded rooms or shanties. They were obliged to devote all their
strength to taking care of the present. They could take little account
of the past, and were often unable to make any record for the future.
They could not do this for those under their own immediate eye in the
hospital; much less could they do it for those who remained in their
tents, and needed little or no medical attention, but only rest.
Moreover, the exposures and labors of the campaign sometimes diminish
the number and force of the surgeons as well as of the men, and reduce
their strength at the very moment when the greatest demand is made for
their exertions. Dr. Mann says, "The sick in the hospital were between
six and seven hundred, and there were only three surgeons present for
duty." "Of seven surgeons attached to the hospital department, one died,
three were absent by reason of indisposition, and the other three were
sick."[40] Fifty-four surgeons died in the Russian army in Turkey in the
summer of 1828. "At Brailow, the pestilence spared neither surgeons nor
nurses."[41] Sir John Hall says, "The medical officers got sick, a great
number went away, and we were embarrassed." "Thirty per cent. were
sometimes sick and absent" from their pos