Page:The Armed Forces Institute of Pathology-ItsFirstCentury.djvu/40

BACKGROUND AND BEGINNINGS they may contribute to the Museum. This will be done under the superintendence of the Curator."

Instructions for forwarding "such pathological objects as compound fractures, bony specimens, and wet preparations generally, obtained after amputation, operation or cadaveric examination" included rough removal of all unnecessary soft parts, wrapping in cloth so as to preserve all spicula and fragments, attaching a tag of wood or sheet lead bearing the number of the specimen and the name of the officer sending it, and immersing the object in a keg or small cask of diluted alcohol or whisky. When filled, the cask was to be forwarded to the Office of the Surgeon General by express, collect. At the same time, a corresponding list or history of the cases was to be mailed to The Surgeon General.

To facilitate the collection of specimens, the following medical officers at major hospital centers were designated to receive and forward them:


 * Surgeon Lavington Quick, U.S. Volunteers, Baltimore
 * Acting Assistant Surgeon Edward Hartshorne, U.S. Army, Philadelphia
 * Acting Assistant Surgeon George Shrady, U.S. Army, New York
 * Surgeon M. Goldsmith, U.S. Army, Louisville
 * Assistant Surgeon F. L. Town, U.S. Army, Nashville
 * Surgeon John S. Hodgen, U.S. Army, St. Louis
 * Surgeon H. S. Hewitt, U.S. Volunteers, Army of the Mississippi

In acknowledging receipt of specimens submitted in response to circular letters and individual communications, Dr. Brinton, upon occasion, inquired as to particular cases of which he had knowledge. For example, in a letter of 17 December 1862, thanking Surgeon John S. Hodgen at St. Louis, Mo., for his contributions, Brinton mentioned that he had not seen among them "one of a gunshot wound of the ear which occurred at Fort Donelson and was treated in the Hospital under your charge last winter," and asked for the specimen and also for "the round ball which inflicted the injury should it be in your possession." Not every wounded man was willing to give up the severed portion of his anatomy or the projectile by which he was struck. As an instance of this occasional unwillingness, there is the case of Pvt. W. H. Knaup of the 2d New Jersey, who was struck by a shell fragment in the left cheek and lost the angle of his jaw. Brinton wrote the surgeon in charge of the hospital at Chester, Pa., to which Knaup had been removed, to "make him 713-028'— 64