Mt. Jackson General Hospital, CSA

Mt. Jackson General Hospital, CSA. Shenandoah at War. , In September 1861, the Confederate Medical Department built a large general hospital on this site because Mt. Jackson was the western terminus of the Manassas Gap Railroad, which provided access to northern Virginia battlefields. Dr. Andrew Russell Meem, a Shenandoah County resident who was a graduate of Princeton University and the University of Pennsylvania Medical College, was Surgeon-in-Charge. He resided at Harrison House, the home of local businessman Col. Levi Rinker, who owned the hospital site and a plot across the Valley Turnpike, “Our Soldiers’ Cemetery,” to bury those who died here., The hospital consisted of three two-story buildings, each “a hundred and fifty feet in length, perfectly ventilated, and yet warm,” and several small support structures. Accommodating 500 sick and wounded Confederates at a time, it remained in continuous service until the end of hostilities, except for six months in 1862. Meem, two assistant surgeons (contract physicians), five stewards, ten nurses, eight cooks, and five laundresses comprised the staff. The buildings were dismantled after the war for the use of U.S. Army forces stationed at Rude’s Hill during Reconstruction., In February 1865, after falling ill, Meem was admitted to Harrisonburg General Hospital where he died at age 41. His wife, Ann Jordan Meem, had assisted him at the Mt. Jackson hospital and in October 1861 organized the Ladies’ Soldiers Relief and Aid Association to provide clothing, food, and supplies. The Association held one of the earliest Confederate Memorial Day services at “Our Soldiers’ Cemetery” on May 15, 1866.