Title: B——, Foster H.

Source text: Surgeon General Joseph K. Barnes, United States Army, The Medical and Surgical History of the War of the Rebellion. (1861–65.), Part 1, Volume 2 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1870), 248.

Keywords:on special wounds and injuries of the headwounds and injuries of the headgunshot woundsgunshot fractures of the cranial bonesremoval of fragments after gunshot fractures of the skullfatal cases of gunshot fractures of the skull treated by the removal or elevation fragmentstreated by operation, not by formal trephiningextent of injury ascertained with precision, organic alterations accurately observedconoidal ball fractured and depressed frontal bone over left orbit, tore off portion of external tableflesh wound of thighcoma, pupils contractedportion of musket ball and depressed fragments of bone removed from anterior lobe of brainportion of inner table depressedmeninges bathed in pusabscess in anterior portion of left hemisphere of brainpost-mortem examination performed

Civil War Washington ID: med.d1e16309

TEI/XML: med.d1e16309.xml


CASE.—Private Foster H. B——, Co. E, 7th Michigan Volunteers, aged 20 years, was wounded at Ream's Station, Virginia, August 25th, 1864, by a conoidal ball, which fractured and depressed the frontal bone over the left orbit, tearing off a portion of the external table two and a quarter inches in length, and nearly an inch in width. In the same engagement he received a flesh wound of thigh. He was taken to the 2d division, Second Corps, hospital, where a portion of both tables was removed by Surgeon G. Chaddock, 7th Michigan Volunteers. On the 28th, he was conveyed to Washington, and admitted to the Lincoln Hospital. Two days later he became delirious. Coma supervened on September 1st, and the pupils contracted. On the 3d, while the coma still existed, Acting Assistant Surgeon T. F. Betton made an elliptical incision through the integuments, and removed a portion of a musket ball and several depressed fragments of bone from the anterior lobe of the brain. The wound was cleansed, and the edges brought together and united by straps of adhesive plaster. The operation failed to relieve the coma, and patient died the same day. The post-mortem examination revealed a portion of the inner table, about the size of a dime, depressed; the meninges of the brain were bathed in pus, and a large abscess existed in the anterior portion of the left hemisphere, the substance of the brain surrounding it being very much softened. The pathological specimen is No. 2078, Sect. I, A. M. M., and was contributed, with the history, by Acting Assistant Surgeon H. M. Dean.