War. During the very beginning of the war, maybe around 1860 there were a lot of quack surgeons even in the army. Doctor little minute 1862 took over the medical corps, he divides the whole thing around. Now hes created an ambulance corps where we could get the men in off the battlefield quicker and faster. He also went and had to contest the surgeons to be army qualified surgeon. That is where it got better and better in the service. 3 million 300,000 died. 700,000 carried wounds off that battlefield. What happens there, when i was dealing with at that time was really a musket went in like a finger and came out like a fist. It shattered the bone so bad there was no way could repair it. Even if you got shot with one of them today in modern days, you cannot put it back together. It would just blow that bone apart completely. The survival rate was great off the amputations. 70 survived the amputations, but then it decreased to 60 due to the spread of disease that set in. At first, there was nothing wrong with him. No disease, no blood poison or anything in his system. The survival great was rate by 70 . But then, the next soldier came on my table and he had blood poisoning or bone infection, or any kind of disease, i will transmit it to the next soldier. From one soldier to the next. If i am here operating, we had holes in the stable. Body parts are leaving all over. Bloods all over the place. I think my knife i wipe off the blood with a bloody apron and i continue doing what im doing. Sterilization did not commit. See how these instruments are dirty . This one from one soldier to the next. Sterilization didnt come in until 1865. Then all of a sudden it was altogether different. If i wouldve had a during the civil war a lot of my soldiers lives wouldve been saved. Because of sterilization. We had painkillers. Opium, morphine. We also put them to sleep. A lot of people did not realize that. We had chloroform. Ten drops of that put into a funnel like this and placed over the face would put him out for about 15 minutes. I could amputate an arm or a leg in five minutes. The faster we did it, the better the survival rate. Was a lot of other things happened around 1862. A lot of soldiers were laying out in the battlefield for 48 hours and longer. We had a soldier came blue masked. He came to me in the morning. The sign on the other side says surgeon is not in. Take to blue mass and see me in the morning. Soldier came to me and said doctor, i havent gone to the bathroom for a while. Have you got something . I will give you some blue mass. When partlow mass and two parts of water. It will make him go. Definitely. The only problem is is you know whats in here . Blue char and mercury. If i keep giving him that, do you know whats going to happen . He will go crazy. So i had to go watch exactly what i was doing with that. Too much of that it would really would harm them. I had leeches over here. Bleaches. Leader pants. Did you realize the danger of the blue mass at the time . No, we did not. Mercury content was almost like a miracle truck at that time. A lot of my medicines here were laced with it. We had pain killers. Opium, morphine and laudanum. You want to take a with of it . You wont feel no pain for the rest of the day. No . Come on, do it. Yummy. You know what the content alcohol. 45 . Green opium, 25. 6 grams. That is was in here. The reason why we put whiskey with it is because opium raw was very bitter. We wanted to take the bitterness away from it. So we had at the alcohol to it. Actually, the surge and drank more of the alcohol. laughter another thing we used. Do you know what this is . It has create salt. The same stuff that you use on telephone courts. Come to the General Hospital, the surgeon would come and open up and see the blue spots. Spots around the stump. All of a sudden he realized it was gangrene setting in. He takes this. Paints the stump with it. It sure as hell stopped the spread of gangrene, but it burned like hell when you put it on it. We had a lot of whiskey as well. We had topaz whiskey. Lincoln sent it to me by the barrel. We used a lot of it for shock. Like i said before, a lot of the times the surge and drink it because the fact is the pressure during the day, we had pure alcohol as well. Thats another thing we would do. If i would come to the General Hospital, i would come to the General Hospital and you would open up the stump and stuff like that. All of a sudden i would see the stump and said it needed to be blood because there was that we put the stump and a bleed or pan like that. We would give him a little cut and let him lead to let stopped. Then we would manage him back up again. A couple of days later we will check on him again. If he still needed to be blood we would put a couple of reaches on him. We would let the reaches suck out the tainted blood. Leeches. You young man. After i amputated arms and legs and i would suture them. You know what suturing is . All of a sudden, i find out i am running out of suture thread. Ive got to use something else. What could i have used at that time . Other than suture thread . Yes. No silk thread. It is my other case. Silk thread is what i used. I did not use cotton thread because it would care too easily. Silk thread. But iran out of it. Now ive got a soldier here on the table have got to suture the stump, but i have no silk thread anymore. What could i have used . Youve got it. The tale of a horse. This is it. Right here. The tale of a horse. It is pliable. It looks good, strong. He had a lot of horses around. The confederacy used a lot of this because of the blockade lincoln had along the coast. They cannot get it unless they overran some of the supply wagons. But they did not like it too much because it was from the horse. They were boiling it. They would suture some of the confederate troops shut. But they did not realize at that time was it would heal quicker and faster. They did not realize and they were sterilizing the horsehair. The union army picked it up later in the war and started sterilizing the horsehair when they started suturing. I will ask you another question, young man. I dealt with chicken pox and measles, months. Who got the most measles and the month. The country boys are the city boys . Those enlisted in the army . Country boys. City boys. Why . Country boys . Do you absolutely agree . City boys city boys . Everybody agrees our country boys . One guy said city boys. Well, on human back there are wrong. It was the country boys that got them. The reason for that is the city boys were raised in the city. They built up an immunity against the disease because they were close together like you are today right here. But the country boy slipped on a farm. They never got off the farm very often. They build an immunity up and when they got into the army, there they are with the city boys that are carrying the measles and mumps and chicken pox. They contacted it. This is what we had to deal with. It was the country boy that got it. We did three types of amputations. We did the circular amputation got the guillotine. We did the double flack amputation. We did the single flak amputation. The single flap amputation was used to take your foot and hand off. I preferred using the circular amputation because it worked faster and quicker and made a nice stump. And you can have an artificial leg when you got one. The double flap amputation you had this knife here. Its sharp on both sides. This is what we did. You would get a hold of the tissue here, pull it off, pulled it off the femur. We would go in here like this, right above the femur and we would cut upward. We would pull the flap back. My assistant would hold the leg of. I would go underneath it and make another flap. Then i would pull to flaps backwards, exposing the femur. After exposed the femur like that, i would take my capital saw. I would start sign through it. I had a tendency, sometimes when you did that, it would snap. Like you take it to buy for and you saw it, and what would happen, you would have a flinch on the end of the femur. We did not want that because what we do then is we would take the bone flange knit are and we would knit all the way around here and make it clean. We would have a bone file. We would file this completely smooth. After we did that, we had a bone brush. We would take the bone brush and brush it clean all the way around and make it smooth. Then we would take this and pull out the femur artery. Pull it out of the stump. We tied them all. We did not cart arise like they did in the revolutionary war. What they did is they would have a fire going over here and a frying pan on top. A cast iron. It would get hot. They would take the cast iron and slap it against the stump. That would cauterize all the small little veins. We do not do that anymore in the civil war. We would pull it out and take silk thread which is in my other case. We would take silk thread and thread it and tie it off and stuff like that. Then we would take the stump and take the two flaps together. It would fit like this because we would suture it around. Thats why when it had a tendency to hemorrhage a lot when you cut an artificial stump because of the pressure on. I did not like to use that. I loved circular amputation. Circular amputation, or the guillotine we would call, it would make a complete circle. You take your knife and cut it all the way around. Thats her circular cut. Then we would pull the skin off. Pull the skin on both sides. Then after we did that we would cut through the tissue and go all the way down and around and we would pull the tissue off the bone. Then we would do the same principle. Pull out the female artery. Tie it off and Everything Else went out. And what we would do is we would tie up the artery. Then what we would do is we would packet with all of. We would see live all the small little veins. And we would take it like this and we would pull the skin over the top of the stump. And we would take for not suture tie. We would suture tie a knot, suture, tie a knot. Then what we would do is we would seal that up. The female artery, we would let it hang out of the stump from the bandages and stuff. What would happen then after that, was when you went to the General Hospital, if the surgeon came around too soon and too fast and it did not heal and he would tug on that suture threat, he could open that up and the soldier would start hemorrhaging and bleeding. We had to watch what we were doing. Thank you. You are welcome. That was explained beautifully. Thank you. Next time, lay on the table and i will demonstrate it for. You laughter this is a giggly saw. See that . The reason for that is in 1863 we started saving arms and legs instead of cutting them off. What we would do is cut down lets pretend this is the leg and this is the femur. We would cut down the damaged part isnt here. We would cut down through the tissue and then we would clean the saw out and pull it off. We would not cut through. We did not go down to the bottom. We just went down to the bone the damaged part. And cut down. Now we take our giggly saw and we would unhook it. We would put a suit your threat on here with a needle. We would go through here underneath. We would come up and saw this way. We would go over here and saw this way. Then it would make a smooth cut like this. We would take all the damaged part out of there. Clean it out. And then we would nd push it together. Bring it together. We would drill holes on both sides. And we would take a silver wire, which was this. We would wire it together. Coincidence, i had no knowledge of how to put nerves together. How to put veins together, but we still had blood circulation because this was connected yet down here. See the tissue . It was still connected down here. Maybe by chance, when you push it together, the veins would come together and connect it, and he had more feeling through his like. We got better and better at it as years went by. And quicker added. We saved a lot more arms and legs. He had like a bulk down here, but at least he had use of it, you know. He could use it. Okay . A soldier laying on the table, when you see a movie. He gets up and hes yelling and screaming and Everything Else. That did not happen. It did not happen. This is what i believe. We had eight stations step set up up near the battlefield. There were assistant surgeons not. There they were a site they were given medecine, morphine, opium. By the time he was on my table he doesnt even know where the hell he is at. Now im going to feed him some more. Im going to put him to sleep. Im going to cut his leg. His arm. Now i believe this. When i took my ammonia water. I place it under his nose. He starts waking up. He starts sitting up. We sit him up. We tap has back. He looks down. Two legs are missing. He will yell and scream and carry on like you wouldnt believe. Why . These are country voice. These are boys that needs their arms and legs to tend to the farm. What will you do know . I think that was the biggest shock they could have. There was no way 90 of all the amputation stone on the table were used with chloroform. We had an adequate supply of it here. The confederacy had a hard time getting the chloroform because of the blockades lincoln had along the coast. The only way they could get it possibly would be if they overrun our wagons. They would get it that way. This, i believe, they did put a stick in their mouth when they operated. They were half drugged, but they could feel it. That is what i believe. Some of them are groaning and moaning on the table. Here is another disbelief. There is no way that i researched, or even my assistant surgeon researched anything that came up about biting the bullet. They say the soldier would lay there and bite the bullet. I put a bullet in his mouth. Like that. And all of a sudden, hes feeling. Hes going to whats going to happen . He will swallow it and choked to death because there is a bullet going down. We never found documentation where there was, in the civil war, biting on the bullet. Everybody said, well i was out on the field and i found a bullet. And theres teeth marks on it. This is what i believe. I believe near that hospital and later on, there were farmlands. Pigs were running around. The pigs would pick them up and bite on them. They would drop them. 20 years from now you come around and all of a sudden you find the split and say oh my god, there is a bullet that some soldier bit on. That is my belief. We dont have any documentation on that. Saying that they were biting the bullet. I have a flag. Here it is the remembrance of the first officer of the war. Colonel are as worth. May 21st 1861. He led a troop of soldiers from washington d. C. Union army maybe three at the very most. When they get there early could find was the Confederate Flag fight flying over everybody thinks this here is the Confederate Flag. This is not what colonel else worth did that is the First OfficialConfederate Flag. Seven states. Seven stars. That is what the colonel had taken down. As he was coming down to stop, the army came. He shot the colonel in the chest and he got shot five times and stabbed seven. He lied there on the floor and they took the body back to washington d. C. And the shipyard. They asked the president permission to embalm the body. He could not grant permission because it was not a family member. The doctor persuaded the president because he was commanderinchief. The president said go ahead and embalm the body. The doctor embalmed the body. He lied. It was not done. When the president heard they were done embalming the body, the president stop doing what they were doing. He immediately went to the fire house. It turned out there he was a close friend of the president mr. Lincoln. He spent many times entertaining the president and his children. He was a member of his staff. That is why the immediately went to the fire house. The dock had just laid down the body naked. There is the president getting out of the cart. Were you gonna do . Tell him to stay there for 20 minutes . I dont think so. The doctor draped the flag up to the kernels shoulder. Mr. Lincoln said he looks like he is asleep. We know this because the newspaper reporters there at the time. A late for a week in washington d. C. Shipped to albany new york, late for another week. A newspaper reporter said this man had been dead for two and a half weeks. There is no sign of death. No swelling, no color change. No smell. It looks like he is still asleep. That is how the average person found out about embalming. The doctor did this with ellsworth and proceeded to charge thereafter. These are tools of the embalming trade of 1861. This is the gravity bomber. It takes less than five pounds of pressure to preserve a person. The gravity system was used in 1701 by doctor raymond, first recorded arterial and bomber. The gravity system is still being used in some Funeral Homes in 2019. These tools are being used and all Funeral Homes in 2019. The only thing that changed in the last 300 years are the chemicals used. But its done exactly in the same way. There was no Chemical Company selling embalming fluid until 1888. Formaldehyde was not patented until years after the civil war. Arterial bombings are very simple procedures. You use the carded artery of the neck or leg. I like using the carter road army artery in the neck. You make an incision in there. Pull the artery out. Put a little notch in the carter road artery. Connected to the gravity bomb. There is the jugular vein. You pull the jugular vein up. Cut it off completely. You want to push all the blood out of the body. You want the blood to come out off both sides. Im done. Very easy when youre done. During the civil war, if the doctor had four or five to do, he would hook them all up at once. No. It could not do that. Morticians could not do that. We could only still do one person at a time. When you start embalming, you have to stay with that person. You have to give them a massage. You want to help move fluid to the body. How do we know where it sat . A tissue becomes rigid. If the lower part is not rigid, we know there is blood we have to get rid of. He stick that in the jugular vein. Work it back and forth and you get blood to come on out. You massage. It another spot. You work the pump. Continue doing that. Eventually you get the bottom fluid to come out. Then you are done arterial and bombing. But there is one part of the body that does not use blood, and that is where decomposition starts first. We have to take care of that area separately. The place that doesnt use blood is your stomach. We have food and acid in the stomach. You insert this in the stomach. Here comes the messy part. You get body fluid to come into the throat. And when you force everything out the rectum we do it through the rectum. Make sure they have no fluid. Now the person is completely preserved. There was little less than 20,000 soldiers that received embalming in the civil war. 640,000. Thats how you to care thats how so many died from disease. That was the number one reason for death in the civil war. The second biggest reason for death was the battlefield. They called him the cook. It was always the womens job back home. Thats why the Field Hospital had a woman cooking and the gentleman or out there cooking for them. The cook did not get in the battlefield. When the body fluid comes out, you tie off the artery. Take a directory probe. Stick it on the other side of that bullet hole. Take a different tube. Slide it right in. Continue to do the embalming. Then youre done and you tie it up. Simple and easy. Padilla you do not need to be embalmed to be buried in america. 48 hours . Cut any questions . Thank you very much you can watch this and other american artifacts programs by visiting our website cspan. Org history,. Tonight, at eight eastern, a look at korean war oral histories. Veteran carl house we counts his part any amphibious landing, a victory for un forces which turn the tide early in the war. He also talks about the surprise chinese counterattack and intense combat where he was captured. Watch korean war oral histories tonight beginning at. Eight eastern tonight on cspan three. Enjoying American History tv this week and every weekend on cspan three. Listen annual event held in may at the u. S. Army heritage and Education Center in carlile, pennsylvania. Hundreds of living history hobbyists are selected by the center to conduct demonstrations and talk to the public about military subjects ranging from the American Revolution to the war on terror. Next, on american artifacts, we visit a medical tent set up as a world war ii u. S. Army battalion aid station. A mobile Emergency Group that would have been l