Richmond's Wartime Hospitals

This history of Civil War medical practice examines the harrowing circumstances faced by doctors and hospitals in Virginia’s capitol.

The Civil War erupted toward the end of a period known as “the medical Middle Ages,” before modern knowledge of bacteria and antiseptics. Doctors of the time, who were considered fully trained after only two-years of study, had few diagnostic tools beyond their own reckoning at hand.

While medical science saw significant advances during the Civil War, hospitals in the Southern states faced overwhelming casualties with few supplies and inadequate personnel. In this study of wartime medical facilities in Richmond, Virginia, Rebecca Calcutt illustrates how exhausted resources rapidly defeated southern doctors’ heroic efforts.

Richmond’s Wartime Hospitals covers the more than fifty hospitals, covering each facility’s location, dates of operation, and surgeon in charge. Where archival information is available, Calcutt includes detailed descriptions of the buildings, first-person accounts of day-to-day operations, and other historical anecdotes.