Hospital ship

“ But what happens in war at sea when the medical supplies run out, or simply aren't there? What can a doctor do for his patients without a hospital or even hammocks to put them in, when the ship is rapidly blowing up under his sick bay? How can he bind up wounds or prevent infection in men who are being swept down a mountainside in Java or New Guinea in a last-minute retreat to the sea away from the enemy whose helmets can be seen rising in a wave of gray steel over the rim of the hill? ”

“ HOSPITAL-SHIP. A vessel fitted to receive the sick, either remaining in port, or accompanying a fleet, as circumstance demands. She carries the chief surgeons, &c. The Dreadnought, off Greenwich, is a free hospital-ship for seamen of all nations.
HOSTAGE. A person given up to an enemy as a pledge or security for the performance of the articles of a treaty. ”

“ You've done enough in furnishing the ship and crew. I'll attend to the rest."
"And Beth and I will be Uncle John's assistants," said Patsy. "We shall want heaps of lint and bandages, drugs and liniments and—"
"And, above all, a doctor," advised Ajo. "One of the mates on my yacht, Kelsey by name, is a half-way physician, having studied medicine in his youth and practiced it on the crew for the last dozen years; but what we really need on a hospital ship is a bang-up surgeon." ”

“ With the utmost haste, she is fitting out a great hospital ship, which the Red Cross Society has offered to provide at its own expense with three hundred beds, with linen, nurses, drugs and dressings. This life-saving [Pg 144] ship will be moored in front of an island close to the scene of battle, but completely sheltered; steam and motor launches will be attached to it to fetch those who are seriously wounded and bring them on board day by day, so that they may be operated upon and tended in peace before infection and gangrene set in. ”

“ To Surgeon General Van Reypen the world is indebted for the Hospital Ship in war. At the International Medical Congress, held in Moscow in 1896, he presented the plan which was carried out by the United States Government in fitting out the Solace and Relief during the present summer, which were the first ever used. A most valuable addition to a fleet in war, not only in the relief afforded to the sick and wounded, but in rendering the ships more efficient by leaving them with fighting men only, unhampered by the sick and disabled. ”

“ The wounded men on board all looked so happy and comfortable.
However, everything comes to him who waits—nothing more quickly than a bullet in these sanguinary days—and after a week at the base hospital at Boulogne I was given a ticket [Pg 229] marked "cot case" and told I was going to be put on board a hospital ship for England. I smiled gratefully at the doctor, tied the ticket round my neck, put on a woollen waistcoat, muffler, and dressing-gown (all presented to me by the hospital) over my pyjamas, and waited my turn to be carried downstairs. ”

“ When Troops go upon an Expedition, besides the common Hospital Ships, another Ship ought to be properly fitted up for the Reception of sick Officers [161] ; and every Hospital Ship ought to be supplied with all Sorts of [381] Provisions, and other Necessaries fit for forming an Hospital, before they leave England.—And one or more armed Vessels loaded with Provisions, Wine, and all Sorts of Necessaries for the Sick, ought to attend them; or if the Expedition be intended for the warm Climates, these Vessels ought to go before the Fleet to take up Wine and Fruits, such as Lemons, Oranges, &c. ”

“ It need not be mentioned, that the surgeon is in constant attendance upon the dying man, who has generally been removed from his hammock to a cot, which is larger and more commodious, and is placed within a screen on one side of the sick bay, as the hospital of the ship is called. It is usual for the captain to pass through this place, and to speak to the men every morning ”

“ In the Commercial Docks are to be seen both English and foreign ships, varying in size and class, most of which are in the timber trade, and have arrived from Norway, Sweden, or Memel, or the Baltic. The number of patients taken from ships in these docks to the Dreadnought hospital ship usually exceeds that from any other dock; but the cases are those not of scurvy, but consumption, bronchitis, and other chest diseases, which occur not so frequently in English sailors as in Norwegians, Swedes, and Russians—a fact due more, I think, to national predispositions than to hygienic conditions. ”

“ Treating men who are seriously injured in a large, well-equipped hospital ashore, where it is possible to give them the absolute rest they require, is one thing. Treating them in a small and crowded sick bay aboard ship, and while that ship is running at full speed in a danger zone, knowing that the enemy may renew their attack again at any moment, and that the patients may have to be put over the side on rafts or merely in life jackets, is another story. ”

“ Only those men who are very unwell, however, are found in their beds; the rest being generally seated on the chests and boxes placed round the bay, a part of the ship which, I need scarcely mention, is kept, if possible, more clean, airy, and tidy than any other. If a speck of dirt be found on the deck, or a gallipot or phial out of its place, woe betide the loblolly-boy, the assistant-surgeon's assistant, and the constant attendant upon the hospital. ”

“ If the surgeon in charge of the train decides that he has a case which [56] should be hastened to a hospital he wires ahead, so that when he reaches that point the surgeon or the agent there is on hand with an ambulance to rush the patient to a local hospital.
Where it is possible, red tape has been eliminated. The cots in which the patients are carried are sent with the patient from a hospital or ship, and the patient is only taken out when he arrives at the hospital of his destination. For the cot bearing the patient, the train surgeon receives in exchange a clean cot. ”

“ In the ordinary piping times of peace a destroyer carries nothing but a medical chest containing the simpler remedies, together with bandages, splints, tourniquets, and dressings. She has no doctor, and if a man is hurt or becomes ill he is given first-aid or relief by one of his shipmates, and is sent to the depot ship or hospital for treatment as soon as possible. ”

“ There is a similar obligation to leave a seriously injured seaman in a port at which a vessel has arrived. [9] This duty of course exists where no adequate treatment can be given on the ship. Here the ship's doctor was not an eye specialist; the ship did not have aboard the medicines which competent physicians in San Francisco applied; and there was no x-ray although one was later found essential for diagnosing the ailment. It is not surprising that the ship should lack these facilities, for every merchant vessel cannot be a floating hospital ”

“ She went from ship to ship, for every vessel, merchantman or man-of-war of whatever nationality, became for the nonce a floating hospital. The most seriously wounded were carried on board the ships, where they could receive better care than in the hospital stations on shore where, in the midst of confusion, and difficulties beyond belief, the faithful surgeons worked early and late under the pitiless rain, drenched to the skin, fasting and{57} suffering with thirst and cold like all the rest. It was a time when men and women toiled with every fibre of their being ”

“ Besides this, room is to be provided for the stowage of fresh rigging, sails, ropes, cables, and yards, to replace those lost by accident, battle, or wear and tear. Besides this, too, there is to be a provision for the hospital. So far for the mere necessaries of the ship. Then we are to regard the science; for nothing can be more essential than the skill and the instruments of the navigator, as nothing can be more fatal than a scientific error, a false calculation, or a remission of vigilance. ”

“ But the Germans! To bomb a field hospital or shell an ambulance, or sink a Red Cross ship is a triumph for them!
It was three o'clock one morning. We lay in the Mediterranean. An accident case needed instant care. I ran to prepare the "theater," as we call the operating room. The patient was treated and had been lifted to a stretcher when the Huns' torpedo struck us.
Then came the crash, the sudden trembling of the ship and the sudden dreadful listing. We carried the man to the deck, scrambling up as best we could. The engine had not been struck, but the stern was shattered. ”

“ Then he was taken off by a British ship and sent to a British naval hospital for the operation. On the cruiser's next trip the sailor was picked up and brought home to finish his convalescence in a naval hospital in the United States.
Sailors show as many varieties of temperament as any other group of men. There are tough customers whose constitutions seem impervious to any injury. Such was the oiler who finally presented himself at sick bay and asked for a cure for chronic constipation. ”

“ Often the vessels were so loaded that the few doctors had not had time to set the broken legs and arms of the men, and many must have died of blood poisoning from the dirt which got into their undressed wounds. Oftener still they had little or no food, and even with help were too weak to walk from the ship to the hospital. ”

“ After arranging for Major Stewart's accommodation at the hospital, we transferred from the —— to the ——. The voyage was resumed on the 15th. When a few days out, one of the ships flagged that there were two cases of appendicitis on board. The convoy was stopped; the ship drew near ours, and lowered a boat with the two cases, which was soon alongside. Meanwhile a large box which had been made by our carpenter was lowered over the side by a winch on the boat deck; the cases were placed in it and hoisted aboard, where the stretcher-bearers conveyed them to the hospital. ”

“ Both ambulances were decorated on all sides with the emblem of the Red Cross and would be invaluable in bringing the wounded to the Arabella. The ship carried a couple of small motor launches for connecting the shore with her anchorage.
They had purposely brought no chauffeurs with them, as Uncle John believed foreign drivers, who were thoroughly acquainted with the country, would prove more useful than the American variety, and from experience he knew that a French chauffeur is the king of his profession. ”

“ No small part of the responsibility of the ship's medical officers, and the hospital corpsmen under them, is to see that all cases do answer sick call; that even minor accidents are reported promptly, and any suspicious skin infections and colds are brought in for examination and treatment. ”

“ Thanks to the loyal co-operation of New York and New Jersey business men, and the Naval Commandeering Board, sufficient quantities of supplies were [180] secured to keep going. A typical example of the difficulties encountered can be illustrated by the activity necessary to equip the ship’s hospital. The market was bare of such supplies, due to the incessant demands from our own and our Allies Army and Navy Medical Departments. Manufacturers of surgical supplies from all over the country were appealed to. ”

“ This gentleman was seated at a writing-table in a larger cabin amidships, opening out of the first apartment; and here I noticed there were a couple of hospital cots rigged up at the farther end, for the treatment, no doubt, of any urgent cases, such as a fall from aloft or other mishap which might happen on board the ship, prior to the removal of the patients to Haslar, which lay within convenient reach up the creek opposite. ”

“ Military hospital ships (article 1) are ships constructed or assigned by States specially and solely for the purpose of assisting the wounded, sick, and shipwrecked. Their names must be communicated to the belligerents at the commencement of or during hostilities, and in any case before they are employed. They must be respected by the belligerents, they may not be captured while hostilities last, and they are not on [Pg 255] the same footing as men-of-war during their stay in a neutral port. ”

“ All relief detachments to be sent to the front, it must be noted, consist of men only; those at home of women nurses; and those on board the hospital ships are of both sexes, namely, one detachment of women nurses and one or two detachments of men nurses, the number of which is fixed proportionately to the size of the capacity of the ships. ”

“ The fact that the crew of hospital-ships, and attached to hospitals on war-ships, are armed for the maintenance of order and for the defence of the sick or wounded, and the existence of a radio-telegraphic installation on board, is not considered as a justification for withdrawing the above-mentioned protection. ”

“ The ambulances, cleared of their burdens at the various hospitals, turned at once and drove furiously back to the station. The hospitals were filled and overfilled and overflowing. Men who could stand more travelling were hurried to the hospital ships. Stretcher-bearers toiled and sweated. The steamers, laden [Pg 206] to their utmost capacity, slipped from the quay side and crept out into the Channel. One hospital was filled and cleared three times in twenty-four hours. The strain on doctors and nurses must have been terrific. ”

“ From this fleet upwards of eleven thousand men were sent to the hospital in the course of that and the preceding year, of whom there died one in seven, besides what died on board of their own ships and in two hospital ships17. 131 The disproportion of sickness in the two fleets will appear still greater, when it is considered that Admiral Vernon’s contained only fifteen thousand seamen and marines18 ”