They make altogether a
huge cluster, with the additional tents, extra wards for contagious
diseases, guard-houses, sutler's stores, chaplain's house; in the
middle will probably be an edifice devoted to the offices of the
surgeon in charge and the ward surgeons, principal attaches, clerks,
&c. The wards are either letter'd alphabetically, ward G, ward K, or
else numerically, 1, 2, 3, &c. Each has its ward surgeon and corps
of nurses. Of course, there is, in the aggregate, quite a muster of
employes, and over all the surgeon in charge. Here in Washington,
when these army hospitals are all fill'd, (as they have been already
several times,) they contain a population more numerous in itself than
the whole of the Washington of ten or fifteen years ago. Within sight
of the capitol, as I write, are some thirty or forty such collections,
at times holding from fifty to seventy thousand men. Looking from any
eminence and studying the topography in my rambles, I use them as
landmarks. Through the rich August verdure of the trees, see that
white group of buildings off yonder in the outskirts; then another
cluster half a mile to the left of the first; then another a mile to
the right, and another a mile beyond, and still another between us
and the first. Indeed, we can hardly look in any direction but these
clusters are dotting the landscape and environs. That little town, as
you might suppose it, off there on the brow of a hill, is indeed a
town, but of wounds, sickness, and death.
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