Welcome to the U.S. Army Medical Department Regiment
Regimental Leadership
General Order 27 establishing the Regiment
The U.S. Army Medical Department was formed on 27 July, 1775, when the Continental Congress authorized a Medical Service for an army of 20,000 men. It created the Hospital Department and named Dr. Benjamin Church of Boston as Director General and Chief Physician. On 14 April, 1818 the Congress passed an Act which reorganized the staff departments of the Army. The Act provided for a Medical Department to be headed by a Surgeon General. Dr. Joseph Lovell, appointed Surgeon General of the United States Army in April 1818, was the first to hold this position in the new organization. The passage of this law marks the beginning of the modern Medical Department of the United States Army.
For much of the Army’s history, the regiment was a tactical as well as an administrative and ceremonial organization, but in the late 1950s the Army reorganized its regiments to meet the requirements demanded by highly mobile warfare with greatly increased firepower and high casualty rates. Between 1957 and 1959, the Army eliminated the regimental headquarters as a tactical and administrative organization from most of its combat arms regiments (except some cavalry regiments). In the reorganization that followed, some Army units lost their identity--their lineage--their history. This loss did not go unnoticed and the U.S. Army Regimental System was created in 1981 to provide soldiers with continuous identification with a single regiment. In 1984, the Combat Arms Regimental System was expanded to include the non-combat arms branches under the “whole-branch” concept in which the entire branch is provided a regimental-model historical bond.
The U.S. Army Medical Department Regiment was activated on 28 July, 1986, during ceremonies at Fort Sam Houston, in San Antonio, Texas, the "Home of Army medicine". Lieutenant General Quinn H. Becker, the U.S. Army Surgeon General and AMEDD Regimental Commander, was the reviewing officer. He was joined by general officers of the U.S. Army Reserves and the Army National Guard, representing the significant contributions and manpower of the reserve forces in the Total Army concept.
THE FORMATION OF THE ARMY MEDICAL DEPARTMENT REGIMENT
This web site been designed to provide you with useful information about the U.S. Army Medical Department (AMEDD) Regiment.
Regimental Leadership
General Order 27 establishing the Regiment