Observations on the report of the Sanitary Commissioners in the Crimea, during the years 1855 and 1856 / by Sir John Hall.

  • Hall, John, Sir, 1795-1866.
Date:
[1857]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Observations on the report of the Sanitary Commissioners in the Crimea, during the years 1855 and 1856 / by Sir John Hall. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

    6/68 (page 4)
    the Medical Department, for months of anxiety, toil, and privation in the Crimea ; and it is disheartening to Medical Officers to find that the meed of praise, which is so justly their due, has been given to civilians who arrived after the difficulties of the army had been surmounted. I am, &c., &c., (Signed) JOHN HALL, Inspector-General of Hospitals {Half Pay.) Since writing the foregoing I have seen a copy of the Eeport furnished to Government by the Sanitary Commis- sioners at the seat of war in Turkey during part of 1855 and 1856, and if my surprise at the laudatory encomiums bestowed on them by Lord Panmure and Lord Palmerston ceases, it is only to be replaced by the astonishment occasioned on reading the Report itself, which ignores the efforts of Army Medical Officers in nearly all sanitary concerns, and attributes either directly or by implication, all merit to the Commissioners themselves in such matters. With what justice I am unable to say, as, until I read their Report, I was wholly unaware of the extent of their assumed labors, and I am still ignorant how far their recommendations swayed the military atithorities in preference to my own, and those of the other members of the Medical Department of the Army, who, according to the report of these gentlemen appear to have remained passive cyphers in the hygienic transactions of the army before Sebastopol; but who, as I think I shall be able to show by the following statement and correspondence, really initiated, or recommended all measures that were essentially necessary for the health of the army, and this the Commissioners cannot plead ignorance of, as they, on more occasions than one, when obtaining useful hints and information, now apparently forgotten by them, stated both to myself and others, that nearly all they could suggest was either actually in operation, or had been recommended by the Military Medical Officers before their arrival, but that they, with the increased powers with which they were invested would be enabled to assist us in getting those measures carried out, Avhich we ought