Hints on the medical examination of recruits for the army : and on the discharge of soldiers from the service on surgeon's certificate : adapted to the service of the United States / by Thomas Henderson.

  • Henderson, Thomas, 1789-1854.
Date:
1840
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Hints on the medical examination of recruits for the army : and on the discharge of soldiers from the service on surgeon's certificate : adapted to the service of the United States / by Thomas Henderson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    The writer was once required by the proper authorities to pay- to the auditor what may be termed smart money. It is still a matter of opinion whether he was right or wrong in passing the recruit, whose expenses he had to pay. Be that as it may, pride of character was so much excited as to make the inspection of recruits a subject of much reflection ; and to lead the writer to read, and to draw from experience, every- thing that could throw practical light on the subject. And lest some brother officer should, in the outset or course of his official career, be subject to like mortification and inconveni- ence, and to facilitate the acquirement of precision and prompti- tude in inspection, with becoming deference, the following work is submitted. The theory and practice of inspecting recruits, like most of our military principles, are materially founded in the experience and usages of the nations of Europe, whose immense armies are, in their organic economy, at once their security and pride. In the composition of this book reference has been abundantly made to the works of European writers, English and continental, as far as they were accessible, and especially to the most valuable volume of Deputy Inspector General Marshall. Mr. Marshall's work is to great extent occupied with statistical tables, the amount of which can be summed up in comparatively few words; with forms of British regulations entirely unnecessary and even uninteresting to us just now ; and with exposition of details as peculiar to the English service as foreign to ours. What there- fore was necessary to the writer's purpose has been readily con- densed, and, thus unencumbered, is distinctly available to the pur- poses of the United States' service. If it should appear that the writer has ventured to dissent from foreign authors on some points, it is sufficient to refer to the inhe- rent difference in the military law of, say England and America, as to service, and especially as to duration of service. Marshall, for instance, may well consider causes objectionable where the recruit has to spend his life in service, which our surgeons might not esteem incompatible with a five years' enlistment; and the require- ments of their colonial service, fatal as that is to the firmest consti- tutions, are vastly higher than need be demanded by any change of climate incident to our service. Hence, the writer has questioned the applicability to the United States' service of some of Mr. Mar- shall's objections to enlistment, though with an exalted opinion of the wisdom and experience of that distinguished surgeon, and witn corresponding distrust of his own judgment, based as it is on com- paratively limited observation. Nor is this difference remarkable,