Existing comment:
From Church to Hospital:
As the tumult of battle subsided, new sounds filled the air; the cries and moans of wounded soldiers. Two days of fighting around Salem Church left about 4,000 men killed or wounded. As soon as the battle ended, Confederate surgeons turned the building into a field hospital. Their work saved hundreds of lives.
Still, 92 Union soldiers and an unknown number of Confederates died at the church and were buried just outside its doors. For several days, surgeons worked tirelessly inside the church, bandaging wounds, administering anesthesia, and removing injured arms, legs, hands, and feet. The human suffering was immense.
The sight inside the building for horror, was, perhaps, never equaled within so limited a space. Every available foot of space was crowded with wounded and bleeding soldiers. The amputated limbs were piled up in every corner almost as high as a man could reach; blood flowed in streams along the aisles and out at the doors….
-- Colonel Robert McMillan, 24th Georgia
One of the Confederate surgeons working at Salem Church was George R. C. Todd, brother of May Todd Lincoln and brother-in-law of President Abraham Lincoln. |