Infection-diseases in the army : chiefly, wound fever, typhoid, dysentery and diphtheria / by Rudolph Virchow ; translated from the German by John James.

  • Virchow, Rudolf, 1821-1902.
Date:
1879
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Infection-diseases in the army : chiefly, wound fever, typhoid, dysentery and diphtheria / by Rudolph Virchow ; translated from the German by John James. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    through the heaviest visitations, so that they are compelled to notice what, to speak accurately, they would not see. Yes, it is astonishing, what schools of suffering the armies have had to pass through before the truth became commonly ac- knowledged! Thus, in the Crimean war, the French army lost one man out of every three, in their whole army, and it is calculated that of the 96,615 men who forfeited their lives, only 10,240 fell before the enemy; about an equal number of wounded died in the Hospitals. The rest, more than 75,000 men, fell a sacrifice to dis- ease. In the American civil war, 97,000 men died in battle, and 184,000 from epidemics and sicknesses. What a huge mass of pain and suf- fering, what a sea of blood and tears stands re- vealed in these figures. But also what a heap of fallacious regulations, of prejudices and misunder- standings. It is unnecessary to lay bare here the long list of these sins and mistakes; fortunately it is sufficiently well known in order to serve as a