Journal of Surgeon Alfred L Castleman.

17th —This is the anniversary of my advent to this noisy, scheming world of vanity and trouble. What wonderful changes have taken place on this continent, in the life time of a little man like me. I will not attempt to write them here; the changes in myself, are sufficient to keep me constantly in remembrance (without a written journal) of the changes going on around me. I hope those of the world are more palpably for the better, than those which I experience. Some malicious representations have been made in camp, today, as to the condition of my hospital, and as to my proper disposal of its funds. I have written to the Brigade Commander, demanding an immediate and thorough investigation. In consequence of the long time that I could get no settlement with the Commissary, I advanced for the sick, and the hospital is considerably my debtor. I hope I shall succeed in getting a thorough examination.

11th.—I have just received a letter from a lady friend of mine aye, and of the soldiers, too, in which she says she “cannot but think of the suffering patriot-soldier, with nothing but a tent above his head, with no covering but a single blanket, and but so little care when sick.” This induces me to put on record here, the following description for reference, a long time hence, when, if this war continues, I may wish to read it and compare it with the hospitals then existing, with the improvements which experience shall have causes to be adopted:

My hospital at present consists of five large tents, fourteen feet long by fifteen feet wide. They open into each other at the ends, so as to make of the whole one continuous tent, seventy feet long. This will accommodate forty patients comfortably. On an emergency, I can crowd in fifty-five. In the center of the first tent is dug a hole about three feet in circumference and two and a half deep. From this hole there passes through the middle of the tents a trench or ditch two feet wide and of the same depth, which terminates in a large chimney just outside of the fifth tent. It is covered for about ten feet of its length, at the beginning with broad stones, the next fifteen feet with sheet iron, thence to the chimney with stones and earth. A fire is made in the hole at the beginning of this ditch, which, through its large chimneys, has a great draught. The blaze sweeps through its whole length, and by means of this fire, no matter what the weather, or how changeable, the temperature in the hospitals need not vary three degrees in a month, and at all times, night and day, have full ventilation without varying the temperature. Since the adjustment of the difficulties, I have my full quota (10) of nurses, and these are never, night or day, less than two on watch. The cots for the sick are ranged side by side, with their heads to the wall and feet to the center of the tent, leaving just room between their sides for the nurses to move freely, and for the patients to get up and down, and between their ends for the ditch, on which, over the covering already described, is a ladder or rack, with slats so close as not to admit the feet between them when the nurses and patients are walking on them.

So long as there is room in the hospital, no patient of my regiment is permitted to be confined to his tent by sickness. The moment he is sick enough to be confined to bed, he is brought to hospital, where he remains constantly under the eye of the Surgeon and nurses till he recovers. There are, to-day, thirty-six in hospital, each, instead of lying with “nothing but a tent above his head, and with no covering but a single blanket,” is on a comfortable bed of straw, the tick emptied and refilled once in four weeks, with all the covering they want. I have plenty of good sheets, and not less than two blankets for each, besides what they bring with them. They are never without fresh meat, rarely without rice, potatoes, jellies in abundance, tea, coffee, sugar, milk, and I am now purchasing for them two dozen chickens a week; and I have this day a hospital fund of not less than one hundred and seventy-five dollars, which is increasing every day, from from which I can replenish or add to the comforts now allowed.[1] This is a description of my own hospital. I regret to learn from the U. S. Medical Inspector who has visited me to-day, that other hospitals are not so well provided or so comfortable. I regret it, because there is no reason why all may not be provided just as well, so long as we remain near a good market; and if they are not, there is blame either in medical or military departments, which ought to be corrected.

From ninth of November to this date, the time I was shut out from the medical supervision of the camp, there have been more deaths in the regiment than during the whole five months before, including the sickly season of August, September and October. The health of the regiment now, however, is good, and I hope it will remain so during the winter.

[1] It may be a matter of some interest to the reader to know how this hospital fund is realized. It is thus: The soldier is entitled to certain rations every day, and these continue, whether he is sick or well. When well, they are drawn by the captains of companies and distributed to the men. When sick and in hospital, the Surgeon notifies the Commissary of the fact, and they are not issued to the Captain, but credited to the hospital. The Surgeon draws them in whole, in part, or not at all. The days’ rations are worth from 17 to 20 cents per man. Now, any economical and honest Surgeon can feed his sick men well when near a market, and save to the hospital fund at least one third of this amount, for the purchase of delicacies. Give him thirty in hospital, he can realize two dollars per month on each man, ($60 per month.) In a neighborhood where markets are very high, this will be proportionally reduced. Where he cannot buy at all, it will be increased.

7th.—Eight days ago to-day, the sick list was 144. Today it is 72! I begin to think that a Surgeon may be as indispensable to an army as a Colonel,—that

“A doctor skilled our deadly wounds to heal,

Is more than armies to the common weal.”

Another “speck of war” yesterday. About ten thousand men from the three divisions here having seen a “track” of the enemy, started in pursuit. After four or five miles march, we came on them in line of battle. Our army looked at t’other army and t’other army looked at our army, when our army came to the conclusion that the “touch” had become “too fresh,” and so they turned around and came home! Oh, but we are a great people. For four months we have been coaxing them to “come out,” and when at last they came out we ran off and left, and the report to-day is that we shall now go into winter quarters here, at a safe distance from the enemy we came to whip! Wonder if we may not soon expect a consignment of petticoats. Hope the ladies association will not send any. I have too much respect for the garment to see it disgraced by being worn by such officers.

The honor of the day is divided between Captain _____, of _____’s Battery, and Colonel _____, of the regiment of _____ Volunteers.[1] Yesterday, on the field, they disputed, each claiming the honor of command. To-day they dispute, each claiming that this honor attaches to the other. “Par nobile fratrum.”

[1] Were I publishing a history of the war, I should feel it my duty to fill these blanks; but as it in only a journal or record of events, as they appeared, at the time, I feel that it is more proper, as a general thing, to turn over persons to the care of the historian.

6th.—Have received to-day a box of delicacies from the good people of Middletown, Connecticut, for my hospital. It is a great comfort to us to feel that the _____ Regiment is remembered in so many places and by so many good people. The contents are generally in fine order, except that a few of the eatables became saturated by some brandy—the corks in some manner having got out of place. This, however, has not injured them. Indeed, many of the sick boys think thatthe contact of the ” spiritual essence” has rather improved them.

All the talk now is of moving, and if we should not be “put forward” next week, I fear our General will lose prestige with this part of the army.

I have had to forbid one of the female nurses admission to the hospital on account of her improper interference with matters under my supervision. I regret this. She is a capable good nurse, but sometimes some things are just as contagious as others, and she meddled and made trouble. I begin to doubt very much the expediency of having female nurses in field hospitals. They are absolutely necessary in the general hospital, but in the field they are out of place.

We have had time to read and deliberate on the President’s Message. It is not what the soldiers expected, or wished. They had prepared their minds for a real sharp-shooter message, but they think this is a “smooth bore,” and carries neither powder nor ball. They like Secretary Cameron’s talk much better, But new beginners are always impatient to be at it. We may become sobered down before long.

5th.—It is now six days since I resumed the charge of the hygiene of the camp. My first work was to have my tent struck and removed from the ground, that the spot on which it stood might be thoroughly sunned and cleaned. I then had the whole sprinkled with disinfectants. Have daily visited every tent since, to see that it was ventilated, by having the bottoms turned up for an hour or two, and that it was well cleaned. The result has been most striking. The sick list has already, in only six days, decreased fifty in number, though the seeds of typhus, sown some time since, still sprout, and occasionally give us serious trouble. Another trouble is off of my hands to-day. I have got a settlement with our Quartermaster, the first I have been able to get since the organization of the regiment. On settlement, I find my hospital fund to amount to one hundred and forty dollars. This sum, above the regular rations, will buy all the comforts my sick need, and will relieve the Sanitary Commission and our friends at home from the expense and trouble of providing those things for us. Nor will this be only temporary, for I find that I can, by good economy, after providing well for all the wants of the sick, still have a surplus of from fifteen to fifty dollars a month, to spare to general hospitals, or to the new regiments who have been less fortunate in providing a fund for this purpose.

4th.—The story of yesterday’s fight is all bosh. There were no two hundred prisoners taken—no fifteen killed—no fight—not a rebel seen! Munchausen must have been the legitimate son of a camp, or rather, the camp must be the legitimate progenitor of the whole race of Munchausen.

But it is surprising how camp life enhances the capacities of some men. I left home in July a dyspeptic. I came to Camp Griffin, in October, weighing one hundred and thirty-nine pounds. I record here, as something worth my remembering, an extract of a letter written to-day to a friend inquiring how camp life affected my health:

” * * * I weigh now one hundred and fifty pounds. I have almost recovered my appetite. With other things in proportion, I now take three cups of coffee for breakfast, three cups tea at dinner, two cups at tea, and eat five meals a day, or suffer from hunger. My last meal is usually taken at 11 to 12 o’clock at night, and consists of one or two chickens, or a can of oysters, with a pot of English pickled cauliflower. With that I contrive to get through the night.

“But with the morrow’s rising sun
The same dull round begins again.”

“Last night, however, I was so unfortunate as to have no chickens. My can of oysters was sour, and I had to put up with a single head of boiled cabbage, half a dozen cold potatoes, and some cold boiled beef. I wonder what I shall do when we get away from the neighborhood of Washington to where there is no market, no oysters, no chickens, no cabbage, no cauliflower, ‘no nothin’.’ I shall be compelled to settle back to dyspepsia, and have no appetite.”

December, 3d.—There is a rumor here to-day that our troops are in possession of both Savannah and Pensacola. I do not believe it.

What do our leaders mean to do with us this winter? Here we are, the 3d December, a cold, freezing, windy day, in our open tents, without intimation of what we are going to do— with no more preparation for winter quarters than we had a month ago. Are we to be kept in this condition all winter? We are getting tired of McClellan’s want of vim. How long is he going to be “getting ready?” All is conjecture, except that the wind howls dreadfully around our tents this cold night.

This morning the three divisions of the army here sent out five hundred to a thousand men each, to beat the bush. This moment comes the statement that they woke up about four hundred rebel cavalry, surrounded them, and that they are even now endeavoring to fight their way out; that they have killed about fifteen of our men; that we have taken about two hundred prisoners, and are fishing in the dark for the rest. All this may be true, but I am getting to be a great doubter of the truth of anything I hear in camp. We shall know all about it to-morrow.

30th.—It is a great relief to my feelings that the difficulties heretofore existing between the Military and Medical Departments in our Regiment are to-day adjusted, and I hope removed by the rescinding the order of the 9th inst, that my directions about the sanitary police of the camps need not be obeyed, and by a substitution of a public order from which this is an extract: “The condition of the health of the regiment requires more than ordinary care. The sanitary regulations of the camp must be entrusted to the Surgeon of the regiment.” I have good reason to hope, too, that all personal feelings of an unpleasant character, which have grown out of this unhappy difference of opinion as to official rights, are removed, and that in future the relations of the two departments may be pleasant to the parties, and beneficial to the sick. I now determined that more than ever will I devote my energies to the removal of the causes of the recent severe sickness, and to counteract their results.

29th.—Since the order of the early part of this month, that my directions in reference to the sanitary measures could be disregarded, I have not visited the camp, or given any directions in regard to cleaning, ventilating, &c., and though it is now but three weeks since that order was made, the sick list, which had decreased in two weeks from about two hundred to thirty-nine, has suddenly run up again to one hundred and sixty, and the diseases are assuming a low typhoid type. So foul are the tents that if a soldier, with simple intermittent, remains three days in his quarters, he is sent to hospital in a condition approximating ship-fever. The seeds of disease are now sown in our regiment, which, in despite of the greatest care, will not fail to yield rich harvests of sickness all winter. Our Governor has been in camp to-day. He has no doubt seen the effect of this military interference, for he has called on me to know if something cannot be done to arrest the trouble. I have laid the whole matter fully before him, and I have no doubt that what is in his power to do, will be done to avert the evil.