Field Medical Services at the Battles of Manassas (review)

book reviews279 social experience in the minds of men made manifest in symbolic action." While his interests are far-ranging, from Benjamin Franklin's personification of the seeming opposites in the American character to the symbolism of Lindbergh's flight, readers of Civil War History will be especially attracted by Ward's analysis of James Fenimore Cooper's The Prairie and Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin. Ward insists that The Prairie is of greater social significance than the more widely read of the Leatherstoeking Tales because Cooper attempts in the novel to illustrate the conflict in American life between the real and the ideal or between Nature and Civilization; it is a theme which Ward believes to be an enduring one in American literature, still surviving as late as Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. Cooper's own ambivalence was the result of his living and writing in an age in which the first consequences of industrial civilization were visible. The discussion of Uncle Tom's Cabin is an excellent correlation of theory and fact. The novel's enormous popularity, Ward contends, is due not only to the serial-like suspense of the story itself but also because Mrs. Stowe touched upon a universal theme in human experience: a journey which symbolizes the quest for life's meaning. Involved as well were the ancient problems of freedom and the role of the individual in society. Ward's explication demonstrates incisively how literature may reveal much of a society's inner dynamics and be of invaluable assistance to the cultural historian. The historian of ideas in America will discover much in this volume to stimulate his own thinking. He will not always agree with Professor Ward's perceptions or his points of emphasis, but he will always find him to be civilized and humane and one who provokes serious thought. Timothy P. Donovan University of Arkansas Field Medical Services at the Battles of Manassas. By Horace H. Cunningham . (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1968. Pp. xii, 116. $2.50.) This brief narrative is concerned with the medical services provided on the battlefield during the first two years of the Civil War. The focus is on the battles of Manassas (Bull Run) and the general theme is that the field health services reflected in microcosm the disorganization of the "improvised war" of 1861-62. Within this seeming chaos, however, Professor Cunningham has detected a growing emphasis on the coordination of the military ambulance services. The "progress" from chaos to more efficient methods of distributing medical services on the battlefield is the central concern of his narrative. There were no professional ambulance personnel to speak of at the beginning of the war. In the Union Army, the task was usually assumed by members of the regimental band. The field hospitals which they es- 280CIVIL WAR HISTORY tablished were inadequately supplied and poorly coordinated. If field medical care was in fact a variable in the balance of the battle, the rout of the Federals at First Manassas is clearly understandable. Yet Cunningham 's description of the medical services in the Confederate ranks points out that they were no better. They had "no genuine ambulance service" and in many cases, the wounded relied largely on self-care. In the months following First Manassas, the Union Army made a conscious , if somewhat futile, effort to systematize the facilities and improve the personnel of its ambulance corps. The Confederate leaders also confronted the problem, but less intensively. When the two sides squared off again in August, 1862, there were few basic changes in evidence. Certain crucial modifications were being advanced, however, especially in the Union Army and these were enlarged upon in later battles. The "ordeal " at Manassas, then, is seen as the arena for the reform of field medical services. Civil War buffs should not be frightened away by the title of the book. Although his primary interest is with medical services, Cunningham rarely strays far from the concerns of military history. Battle plans are clearly drawn, regiments are in line, and exposed flanks are swiftly assaulted ! The social historian interested in medicine and public health, on the other hand, may also find something...