PREFACE
The purpose of this volume is twofold: to furnish a record of experiences incident not only to the actual provision of the military hospitals in the United States during the World War but to their administrative operation as well; and, in so far as it has been practicable, to record the histories of the hospitals separately in order that their individual identities might be perpetuated.
The material has been arranged to deal with generalities first and then with the individual organizations.
Professional activities are considered in other volumes of the history, appropriate in each case to the particular specialty involved. The plan consistently followed here has been not o include any of these except as they intimately affected organization or administration, when, to avoid a breach in continuity or the semblance of devitalization, they have been briefly recounted.
It was obviously impossible to include complete histories of all the many military hospitals in the United States, so a representative of each of the various types has been selected for description. Hospitals whose histories were most complete were chosen in each instance for this purpose.
To show what each of the hospitals accomplished and the staff requirements of each, statistical tables have been prepared exhibiting, numerically, the number of patients treated and the personnel provided for their treatment. These tables have been appended to the hospital concerned when that hospital has been separately considered; otherwise, they have been given in synopsis form by hospital groups. These tables are imperfect: complete data either were not furnished by the hospital during the war, or they have been misplaced since. They are not considered an end, but rather a means to an end, and for this reason it is felt that they will amply serve their purpose despite minor errors.
During the earlier stages of the preparation of this volume Lieut. Col. Casey A. Wood, M. C., was in direct charge of its compilation. Colonel Wood accomplished much valuable work on his assignment, but the exigencies of the service resulted in his separation from activities connected with the history, except as a member of the editorial board. Since Colonel Wood`s separation from the service in October, 1920, much pertinent material became available, necessitating the rearrangement of the volume.
Acknowledgment is made to Col. Charles Lynch, M. C., for much of the material in Chapter XXII, on embarkation and debarkation hospitals; to Dr. Loy McAfee, for helpful advice on the general arrangement of the contents of the volume and for the condensation of a number of the individual histories of base hospitals; to Col. A. E. Truby, M. C., for the chapter on the airplane ambulance; to Lieut. Col. S. M. DeLoffre, M. C., for data on the construction of aviation hospitals; to Maj. Floyd Kramer, M. C., for the material on the construction of temporary hospitals and the procurement of hospital space in existent buildings; and to Mr. Arthur W. Hodgkins for the preparation of the illustrations from which practically all of the line cuts have been made.
aFor the purposes of the Medical Department of the United States Army in the World War, the period of war activities extends from April 6, 1917, to December 31, 1919. In the professional volumes, however, in which are recorded the medical and surgical aspects of the conflict as applied to the actual care of the sick and wounded, this period is extended, in some instances, to the time of the completion of the history of the given service. In this way only can the results of the methods employed be followed to their logical conclusion.
