Hospital Sketches
Hospital Sketches, Louisa May Alcott’s book about her nursing experiences provides an exemplary description of the constant routine of a Union Army nurse. Waking at six o’clock, Louisa quickly dressed and despite soldiers’ objections, opened any available windows to allow some air into the scarcely ventilated room. She attended to the fires, fixed soldiers’ blankets, and chatted with patients and other staff. Breakfast was the same every day. The fried bacon, bread, and butter and watery coffee did not please Louisa, yet despite coming from a vegetarian family she did eat it. Work after breakfast could consist of any number of chores: washing faces, sewing bandages, giving medicine, helping the doctors to dress serious wounds, changing bandages, organizing orderlies, dusting, and obtaining supplies. While many nurses did not assist with amputations, Louisa did watch a number of them. After lunch, while many of the soldiers napped, Louisa continued with her chores, helped soldiers to write letters home and often read from the Charles Dickens books she brought from home. Dinner was eaten at five o’clock and was followed by the doctors’ evening visits, administering medicines, fixing beds, singing lullabies and getting ready for sleep. Louisa’s day usually ended at nine o’clock with “lights out.” [18}
Louisa’s writings include descriptions of the personal connections she made with soldiers. In particular, she writes about John Suhre, a Union Army soldier from Virginia whose lungs were pierced by a bullet and who suffered as if he were being stabbed with every breath. Impressed by John’s bravery and kindness in the face of his suffering and impending death, Louisa spent as much time with John as she could. Louisa recognized how important her company was to John as she wrote, “I knew that to him, as to so many, I was the poor substitute for mother, wife, or sister.” With him when he died, Louisa hailed John Suhre as a hero and model Union soldier. Louisa’s reflections indicate that despite her sadness, she saw hope in death and viewed death as a “welcome healer” [19] It is clear that Louisa connected her role as a nurse to that of a mother; her work at Union Hospital was to provide care and soothing treatment to the soldiers.
Despite frustrations with the unorganized, dirty hospital and concern over how much work there was to do, Louisa truly valued her work and was happiest when she helped the soldiers. “More flattering than the most gracefully turned compliment, more grateful than the most admiring glance, was the sight of those rows of faces,” she wrote in Hospital Sketches, “all strange to me a little while ago, now slighting up, with smiles of welcome, as I came among them.” Louisa was soon transferred to the night shift where she continued to work hard (thought she benefitted from the ability to visit the sights of Washington D.C. during the day time) and care for patients. Recognizing the importance of her work, Louisa wrote in her journal, “…the Washington experience may do me lasting good. To go very near death teaches one to value life, and this winter will always be a very meaningful one to me.”[20] The importance of Louisa’s work at and writing from Union Hotel Hospital is key in understanding the female nursing experience, medical care, and life for Union Army soldiers at Union Hospital; that Louisa was a writer and lived at a time where literary culture was valued and preserved has enormous benefits to enhancing our modern understanding of Civil War medical care.
While acknowledging the benefits of her wartime experience, Louisa did face many frustrations in her work at Union Hotel Hospital. Her living conditions were sparse and inhospitable; she slept on an uncomfortable iron bed with a thin mattress in a room she shared with another nurse which was lit from the outside by broken windows and no curtains. A narrow fireplace warmed the room but most logs were too big for the opening and Louisa had to frequently push the log further into the fireplace as it burned. Cockroaches and rats could be heard in the small closet and walls and a mirror as small as a muffin hung over a small tin basin with a pitcher and mugs nearby. Overall, Louisa saw her room as “cold, dirty, and inconvenient.” The food at Union Hospital was equivalent to “that of a prison” and consisted of beef, “evidently put down for the men of ‘76” as Louisa sarcastically described, bread “composed of saw-dust,” and stewed black-berries “much like preserved cockroaches.” [21} Louisa’s apt descriptions bring an immediacy to the reader of Hospital Sketches, who should be as rightfully disgusted by these conditions as was Louisa.
Louisa was particularly frustrated with the lack of order that existed at the Union Hotel Hospital. After she had the chance to visit the Armory Hospital, Louisa reflected on the differences between that and her own, “Here [at the Armory Hospital], order, method, common sense, and liberality reigned…at the [Union Hotel Hospital] disorder, discomfort, bad management, and no visible head reduced things to a condition which I despair of describing.” Louisa reported that recuperating patients often served as orderlies only to cause trouble and confusion among other staff and the patients.[22]
Louisa was also bothered by what she saw as a lack of empathy for some patients and staff. She wrote, “Dr. P seemed to regard a dilapidated body [with pleasure], the more intricate the wound, the better he liked it. A poor private with both legs off, and shot through the lungs, possessed more attractions for him than a dozen generals.” Louisa was also shocked by the treatment of black contraband workers by the white staff at the hospital. (Though according to historian Jane Schultz, Louisa herself never recognized the black staff by name and saw black contraband workers as something of a novelty.) Male patients and staff swore at the black workers and nurses never thanked black orderlies for bringing their food or handling other chores. One nurse scolded Louisa for playing with a contraband orderly’s baby in the kitchen. “How can you?” she said, “I’ve been here six months and never so much as touched the little toad with a poker.”[23] Outraged by the inhumanity and lack of order at Union Hospital, Louisa’s response shows that she brought many of her family’s values for reform, equality, and humanity to her work at Union Hotel Hospital; her frustrations indicate her desire that patients and staff be treated with respect, fairness, and dignity.
Louisa’s writings include descriptions of the personal connections she made with soldiers. In particular, she writes about John Suhre, a Union Army soldier from Virginia whose lungs were pierced by a bullet and who suffered as if he were being stabbed with every breath. Impressed by John’s bravery and kindness in the face of his suffering and impending death, Louisa spent as much time with John as she could. Louisa recognized how important her company was to John as she wrote, “I knew that to him, as to so many, I was the poor substitute for mother, wife, or sister.” With him when he died, Louisa hailed John Suhre as a hero and model Union soldier. Louisa’s reflections indicate that despite her sadness, she saw hope in death and viewed death as a “welcome healer” [19] It is clear that Louisa connected her role as a nurse to that of a mother; her work at Union Hospital was to provide care and soothing treatment to the soldiers.
Despite frustrations with the unorganized, dirty hospital and concern over how much work there was to do, Louisa truly valued her work and was happiest when she helped the soldiers. “More flattering than the most gracefully turned compliment, more grateful than the most admiring glance, was the sight of those rows of faces,” she wrote in Hospital Sketches, “all strange to me a little while ago, now slighting up, with smiles of welcome, as I came among them.” Louisa was soon transferred to the night shift where she continued to work hard (thought she benefitted from the ability to visit the sights of Washington D.C. during the day time) and care for patients. Recognizing the importance of her work, Louisa wrote in her journal, “…the Washington experience may do me lasting good. To go very near death teaches one to value life, and this winter will always be a very meaningful one to me.”[20] The importance of Louisa’s work at and writing from Union Hotel Hospital is key in understanding the female nursing experience, medical care, and life for Union Army soldiers at Union Hospital; that Louisa was a writer and lived at a time where literary culture was valued and preserved has enormous benefits to enhancing our modern understanding of Civil War medical care.
While acknowledging the benefits of her wartime experience, Louisa did face many frustrations in her work at Union Hotel Hospital. Her living conditions were sparse and inhospitable; she slept on an uncomfortable iron bed with a thin mattress in a room she shared with another nurse which was lit from the outside by broken windows and no curtains. A narrow fireplace warmed the room but most logs were too big for the opening and Louisa had to frequently push the log further into the fireplace as it burned. Cockroaches and rats could be heard in the small closet and walls and a mirror as small as a muffin hung over a small tin basin with a pitcher and mugs nearby. Overall, Louisa saw her room as “cold, dirty, and inconvenient.” The food at Union Hospital was equivalent to “that of a prison” and consisted of beef, “evidently put down for the men of ‘76” as Louisa sarcastically described, bread “composed of saw-dust,” and stewed black-berries “much like preserved cockroaches.” [21} Louisa’s apt descriptions bring an immediacy to the reader of Hospital Sketches, who should be as rightfully disgusted by these conditions as was Louisa.
Louisa was particularly frustrated with the lack of order that existed at the Union Hotel Hospital. After she had the chance to visit the Armory Hospital, Louisa reflected on the differences between that and her own, “Here [at the Armory Hospital], order, method, common sense, and liberality reigned…at the [Union Hotel Hospital] disorder, discomfort, bad management, and no visible head reduced things to a condition which I despair of describing.” Louisa reported that recuperating patients often served as orderlies only to cause trouble and confusion among other staff and the patients.[22]
Louisa was also bothered by what she saw as a lack of empathy for some patients and staff. She wrote, “Dr. P seemed to regard a dilapidated body [with pleasure], the more intricate the wound, the better he liked it. A poor private with both legs off, and shot through the lungs, possessed more attractions for him than a dozen generals.” Louisa was also shocked by the treatment of black contraband workers by the white staff at the hospital. (Though according to historian Jane Schultz, Louisa herself never recognized the black staff by name and saw black contraband workers as something of a novelty.) Male patients and staff swore at the black workers and nurses never thanked black orderlies for bringing their food or handling other chores. One nurse scolded Louisa for playing with a contraband orderly’s baby in the kitchen. “How can you?” she said, “I’ve been here six months and never so much as touched the little toad with a poker.”[23] Outraged by the inhumanity and lack of order at Union Hospital, Louisa’s response shows that she brought many of her family’s values for reform, equality, and humanity to her work at Union Hotel Hospital; her frustrations indicate her desire that patients and staff be treated with respect, fairness, and dignity.