Nursing during the civil war

1. Amber Shelton Nursing during the civil war

2. Prior to the Civil War • Women were prevented from working outside of their house. • They had to run the households, private businesses, uphold the farm, and make food available for the rest of their family while the men were in the war. • Most nurses throughout the United States were males. • The closest thing to nursing that women did at home was to care for sick family members.

3. Start of the War • Newspaper accounts were seen by many women explaining the scarce military medical treatment and the lack of medical materials. • With the lack of education and experience, women volunteered to take care and treat injured or sick soldiers from the battlefield in hospitals. • Doctors did not want women nurses or care for them. • They did not trust that women were knowledgeable or organized.

4. Dorothea Dix • Volunteer selected as the “Superintendent of Women Nurses” due to the need of nurses. • She worked hard to get women to work in military hospitals in order to help the wounded • Guidelines to get accepted into hospitals to be a nurse: at least thirty years of age, or older, try not to look too attractive, be plain, be able to pay their way, and have two letters of recommendation • approximately 3,200 women served

5. Nursing • women wanted to help with the wounded • Army men started to see that Dix would do anything she could to supply the necessary aid in order to organize hospitals for the ill. • She relieved surgeons by hiring women to be nurses for them in the hospitals.

6. Catholic Nuns • volunteered as nurses • helped in hospitals and on different steamships • only people, male and female, that were trained nurses at first • the reason for this was because they already had twenty-eight Catholic hospitals • so, they had a lot of education and experience

7. Leaving home • Not all women had to actually leave their home to help. • Around one thousand women volunteered in hospitals.

8. What women did: • Offer medical care and treatment • Calmed them, fed them, wrote letters to their family members, read to them, and prayed with them • Prepared the food and cleaned the laundry

9. African-American Nurses • did not have it easy • normally received the boring jobs • They were surrounded by the most dangerously ill patients and were expected to care for them. • They were only allowed to take care of African-American soldiers.

10. Clara Barton • Soldiers did not suffer because of the lack of attention, but because there was not enough medical supplies for all of the soldiers. • asked anyone that could to give her donations • started her own organization in order to give out supplies to all of the soldiers possible • received authorization to hand out materials directly to the front

11. The Results • Dorothea Dix realized that her rules for acceptance to be a nurse were too strict because there were so many men being injured. • Nurses were paid 40 cents • Provided with housing and transportation

12. The Rules • Nurses were needed so badly that when someone was rejected from helping, it caused friction. • Dix lost the responsibility of accepting nurses. • She continued to help soldiers, along with their families, to deal with the stress of recovery.

13. Mary Ann Bickerdyke • She began a cleanup effort when she saw how nasty hospitals were. • She went out of her way to get supplies for the men in the war. • involved with the Underground Railroad • She had respect for slaves and asked them for help occasionally. • When the last person was discharged from the hospital where she worked, she resigned from her position and focused the rest of her life on her family.

14. Significance of Nurses during the Civil War • Through the whole war, nurses constantly helped. • Even when the sights were sickening, like limbs that had been blown off, the nurses hurried to help and assist them, ease their pain, feed them, and give them water. • The nurses left a legacy far more than the country would truly appreciate. • People acknowledged the enormous impact nursing made on the war and it became a valid profession.

15. Works Cited • Egenes, Karen. "Nursing During the US Civil War: A Movement Toward the Professionalization of Nursing." Hektoen International. http://www.hektoeninternational.org/Journal_NursingduringCivil War.html (accessed November 25, 2013). • Stein, Alice. "Civil War Nurses."History Net: Where History Comes Alive. http://www.historynet.com/civil-war-nurses (accessed November 25, 2013). • "Women in the US Military - Civil War Era."Women in the US Military - Civil War Era. http://chnm.gmu.edu/courses/rr/s01/cw/students/leeann/history andcollections/history/lrnmreearlycivil.html (accessed November 25, 2013). • "Women Nurses in the Civil War." www.carlisle.army.mil. http://www.carlisle.army.mil/AHEC/AHM/civilwarimagery/Civil_ War_Nurses.cfm (accessed November 25, 2013).

16. Pictures Cited: • "Archives and Records History." Archival History. N.p., n.d. Web. 25 Nov. 2013. <http://www.cscsisters.org/contact/archives/Pages/archives_history.aspx>. • "Civil War Librarian." : News----Someone's MA Thesis Begins In These Acid Free Boxes. N.p., n.d. Web. 24 Nov. 2013. <http://civilwarlibrarian.blogspot.com/2011/04/news-someones-ma.html>. • "Civil War Saga." Civil War Saga. N.p., n.d. Web. 24 Nov. 2013. <http://civilwarsaga.com/the-roles-of-women-in-the-civil-war/>. • "Clara Barton." , Civil War Nurses, Civil War Women. N.p., n.d. Web. 25 Nov. 2013. <http://www.civilwaracademy.com/clara-barton.html>. • "Dorothea Dix." Dorothea Dix. N.p., n.d. Web. 24 Nov. 2013. <http://www25.uua.org/uuhs/duub/articles/dorotheadix.html>. • "GENERATIONS." GENERATIONS. N.p., n.d. Web. 25 Nov. 2013. <http://bartchristmas.blogspot.com/2010/07/general-nurses-of-civil-war.html>. • "Mary Ann Bickerdyke." Voices of the Civil War. N.p., n.d. Web. 25 Nov. 2013. <http://blogs.loc.gov/civil-war-voices/about/mary-ann-bickerdyke/>. • "The New York History Blog." The New York History Blog. N.p., n.d. Web. 25 Nov. 2013. <http://newyorkhistoryblog.org/2011/10/12/carol-kammen-upstate-women-in-the-civil-war/>.