Civil War Washington

CASE 403.—Private J. O'Conner, Co. F, 16th Michigan, aged 16 years, was wounded at Cold Harbor, June 2, 1864. He reached the Fifth Corps Hospital at White House three days after the injury, and was thence conveyed to Washington, where he entered the Armory Square Hospital June 10th. Acting Assistant Surgeon G. K. Smith made the following report of the case: "A minié ball entered the external aspect of the left thigh three inches above the patella, and, passing obliquely inward and upward, fractured the shaft of the femur through the upper end of the lower third, making its exit posteriorly. The patient was treated by Acting Assistant Surgeon T. O. Bannister. Hodgen's splint was used, and no extension was applied other than the tying of the foot to the foot-board with a bandage. During the treatment eight small fragments of bone were removed. On December 27th the patient, though his wound had not entirely healed, was transferred to the Veteran Reserve Corps and placed on guard duty; but being unable to perform it, he was readmitted to the hospital for treatment several weeks afterwards. He came under my care on June 22, 1865, at which time he was in good health, but slightly lame and able to walk without a cane. There was still a slight discharge of sero-purulent fluid from the wound. The limb was shortened one and one-fourth inches, and, at the seat of the fracture, it was a little larger than normal but not otherwise deformed. On July 18, 1865, the patient was mustered out of service, with his wound still open." Examiner W. G. Wilkinson, of Farwell, Michigan, May 16, 1876, certified to the wound, and stated: "The fracture has been followed by necrosis of bone, several pieces having been removed during the year 1875. The sciatic nerve was injured, and the veins are in a varicose condition. The wound has continued open." The pensioner was paid June 4, 1879. His photograph, taken at the Army Medical Museum in June, 1865 (Surg. Phot. Series, No. 49, A. M. M.), is copied in PLATE LXIV, FIG. 2, opp. p. 198.