Civil War Washington

CASE 6.—Private James Vanderworker, Co. E, 46th N. Y.; age 19: was admitted Oct. 5, 1864, with a gunshot wound of the fingers. On the 12th he was attacked with tonsillitis and on the 22d diphtheria was developed. He died on the 26th. Post-mortem examination: A false membrane lined the larynx, trachea and bronchial tubes, forming on the left side a complete cast of the whole of the air-passages to the minutest ramifications, but not extending into the air-vesicles. The right lung was not involved. A small portion of the membrane had been detached from the surface of the larynx and hung loosely in the cavity. Large portions of it were also detached from the trachea and lost. In the left bronchus was found a perfect tube. When the false membrane had been detached the mucous membrane was found to be highly congested and to have lost the more superficial parts of its epithelium. [Specimen 411, Med. Sec, Army Medical Museum, shows the left bronchial tube and its principal ramifications occupied by a tubular cast of pseudomembrane.]—Ass't Surgeon C. A. McCall, U. S. A., Mount Pleasant Hospital, Washington, D. C.