Civil War Washington

CASE 1058.—Private W. E. Vandermark, Co. I, 126th New York, was wounded at Chancellorsville, May 3, 1863, and was treated in a Second Corps field hospital until the 9th, when he was admitted into Armory Square Hospital. Surgeon J. H. Brinton, U. S. V., noted as follows: "The ball entered on the left buttock four inches behind the great trochanter, and passed up the penis from the base to the right portion of the corona glandis, where it emerged. There had been a collection of urine in the scrotum, which had been freely laid open. The urine passed by the meatus, by the wound of exit, and by the artificial opening in the scrotum. A catheter was used, and the wound did well." This patient was transferred to New York Harbor, October 29th, and returned to duty December 8th, but was soon sent to Convalescent Camp, and thence to Campbell Hospital, Washington, February 9, 1864, and registered as a case of "gunshot wound of the penis and scrotum." He was transferred to the Veteran Reserve Corps in March, and was finally discharged November 15, 1865, and pensioned. The following special report of this case was made, on June 13, 1871, by Dr. H.W. Sawtelle: "He was wounded by a conoidal ball and buckshot, which struck the left gluteal region three and a half inches posterior to the trochanter major, and, passing to the right and forward, emerged anteriorly through the genital organs, in four pieces—one from the right side of the penis, just behind the corona glandis, which was thought to have followed the course of the urethra; another through the left testis; and two through the body of the penis close to the scrotum. The scrotum soon became enormously distended with blood, which was evacuated on the field twenty-four hours after the injury. From the first the patient was unable to void the urine, and the use of a catheter produced such intense pain during each evacuation of the bladder that the administration of chloroform was necessary from May 4th to July 17, 1863. Two small pieces of bone discharged from the wound of the penis at the scrotum, through which opening the urine partially escaped for one year. I saw this man in March, 1871, and found the wounds healed, except the one at the cervix penis, where a small fistulous opening existed, through which urine escaped. The motions of the hip-joint were somewhat circumscribed, so that he walked with a slight limp; his general health was good. He had suffered continuous pain in the urethra and hip; it was much aggravated in damp weather, and micturition increased the pain in the urethra. The invalid stated that he had been obliged to suspend his business as a driver of a milk-wagon on account of the greatly increased pain and swelling it caused in the hip and wounded testis." Pension Examiner J. O. Stanton, of Washington, reported, May 15, 1872: "Ball entered the left natis and made its exit on the left side of the scrotum and right of the penis, cutting the urethra in its course. His disability is total." September 9, 1873, Examiner Stanton continues: "The left testis is now slightly swollen and tender. Urine still passes through the fistulous opening on the right side of the penis just behind the glans. Shot wound of the inner portion of the upper third of the right thigh; this wound does not disable him at present." This pensioner was paid on September 4, 1873.