The National Museum of Civil War Medicine
If you are seeking a cheap museum and are a history lover, you most definitely need to check out the National Museum of Civil War Medicine. The Museum is located in Frederick, Maryland on East Patrick Street. There is a $10.50 admission fee per adult, but my boyfriend and I found a Groupon deal where we got two tickets for only $8!
You can experience the National Museum of Civil War Medicine either with a guided tour group of up to 40 people, or you can do a self guided tour, which is what we chose to do!
What Will You See During Your Visit?
During your visit to the NMCWM, “you will follow in the footsteps of soldiers and surgeons to discover the harsh conditions, personal sacrifices and brilliant innovations of Civil War medicine, innovations that continue to save lives today” (National Museum of Civil War Medicine).
The museum showcase’s the lives and activities of the doctors, patients, and caregivers who served during the War. From the horrors of war, there emerged systems of triage and care still used in the United States military today! On your visit, you can expect to learn all about drugs that were used during war such as chloroform as an anesthetic, opium, alcohol, iodine, mercury-based drugs and more.
Sickness and injury were one of the biggest concerns during the Civil War. Luckily, for the soldiers that needed amputations, anesthesia was administered so that they did not feel a thing. Around 620,000 soldiers died during the duration of the Civil War. Two-thirds of those soldiers died of diseases such as measles, malaria, smallpox, nutritional diseases and the number one killer was, surprisingly, diarrhea. One third of those 620,000 died of wounds.
Surgeons and Influential Figures
One of the most interesting and influential people that were featured in the exhibit was Dr. Jonathan Letterman, an Army Medical Director who invented an evacuation plan and the first abundance! Letterman realized that there were hundreds of hurt and sick men that were not being taken care of in time. He invented the four-wheeled ambulance with the goal of getting wounded, suffering soldiers to a hospital as soon as possible. This method is still used today!
I loved seeing and reading about the faces of the surgeons from the Civil War. One man who stuck out to me was Alexander T. Augusta. Alexander was a black man who was born free in Norfolk, Virginia in 1825. Although there were laws in Virginia prohibiting the teaching of black children, Alexander received secrete education from a local minister. He applied to several medical schools in the U.S. but all denied his application. He was accepted to Trinity College of the University of Toronto and graduated with a Bachelor of Medicine degree in 1856. Alexander was one of only 8 black commissioned physicians during the Civil War. It was incredible to read about him.
Wax Figure Exhibits
When you walk through the museum, you will see multiple real-life-looking wax figure exhibits. Many of the exhibits show what the original ambulance wagon looked like, as well as the doctors who dressed in a special blue uniforms.
Another exhibit shows a little bit of what camp-life looked like for the men serving in the war. Most of their time at camp was said to have been spent playing card games, poker, doing chores, sewing uniforms, drinking alcohol, taking care of the animals, and more.
One life-like example shows the act of putting a soldier to sleep with chloroform so that the surgeons could perform an amputation on his wounded leg. I believe that the use of anesthesia was a large misconception. Personally, I didn’t think that anesthetics were used during the Civil War which horrified me. But, 95% of the procedures done were administered with some form of anesthetic.
Final Thoughts
This museum was packed full of awesome information. I could tell that so much care went into the creation of it. If you are in Frederick, please give this museum a visit. I enjoyed my time here and would love to go back again with my entire family!
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