Thousands of Wounded

Thousands of Wounded. . After the fighting ended, medical officers from both armies faced caring for 16,420 wounded men. Army surgeons, assisted by civilian doctors and nurses, and hundreds of soldiers, struggled to provide effective medical care with limited resources. As was typical at the time, armies transported wounded soldiers off battlefields to nearby towns for care. Most of the 8,408 Union wounded went by steamboat to nearby Savannah, Tennessee, or even farther away to northern cities. Most of the 8,012 Confederate wounded went first to Mississippi. From Corinth, many were transported by rail to communities throughout the western Confederacy., Limited transportation options forced Union medical officers to establish makeshift field hospitals on Shiloh battlefield. Here on the high ground surrounding the Cantrell farmhouse, Dr. Bernard Irwin set up a 300-patient tent hospital. Using the four-room house as the surgery station, Irwin had tents, bedding, and supplies confiscated from Union camps to equip this hastily crafted battlefield medical facility., I desireto call the especial attention...to the admirable hospital arrangements adopted by Dr. Irwin, during the battle...They will be found as nearly perfect as the circumstances would allow. , Brigadier General William Nelson , 4th Division, Army of the Ohio, (captions) , Irwin's tent hospital at Shiloh was a forerunner of modern mobile army surgical hospitals., Dr. Bernard J.D Irwin learned from his experience at Shiloh. Triage on the field, rather than transporting the wounded, resulted in better patient response to treatment and more lives saved., This Union fleld hospital in Virginia shows a scene similar to Shiloh and Corinth in the aftermath of the battle.