"[35] "The general return, showing the primary
admissions into the hospitals of the army in the East, from the 10th
April, 1854, to the 30th June, 1856, gives only 162,123 cases of all
kinds."[36] But another Government Report states the admissions to be
162,073.[37] Miss Nightingale says, "There was, at first, no system of
registration for general hospitals, for all were burdened with work
beyond their strength."[38] Dr. Mann says, that, in the War of 1812, "no
sick-records were found in the hospital at Burlington," one of the
largest depositories of the sick then in the country. "The
hospital-records on the Niagara were under no order."[39] It could
hardly have been otherwise. The regimental hospitals then, as frequently
must be the case in war, were merely extemporized shelters, not
conveniences. They were churches, houses, barns, shops, sheds, or any
building that happened to be within reach, or huts, cabins, or tents
suddenly created for the purpose. In these all the surgeons' time,
energy, and resources were expended in making their patients
comfortable, in defending them from cold and storm, or from suffering in
their crowded rooms or shanties. They were obliged to devote all their
strength to taking care of the present. They could take little account
of the past, and were often unable to make any record for the future.
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