Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 17.djvu/21

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Confederate Surgeons.
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fuller recognition from society and the world. As Pinckney and Rutledge, Moultrie and Marion, Pickens, Gadsden, Sumter, Richardson, and Bratton left to their descendants a record of good birth, character and capacity, there was presumptive evidence that such superior hereditary qualities would be maintained. Can there be any doubt, also, that Hampton, Butler, Anderson and Kershaw; Gregg, Hagfood, Evans, Bratton and Jenkins; McGowan, Elliott, Conner, Manigault, Aiken and Capers; Barker and Gaillard, McMaster and Haskell; the Wallaces, and—

" Hundred others whom we fear to name,
More than from Argos or Mycenae came,"—

must justly transmit to their descendants some of the fame which they so dearly acquired, and that the halo which surrounded their brows will not entirely disappear in the lapse of time.

So we hope to transmit to the descendants of the survivors, testimonials to the conduct and behavior of their proavi.

It is becoming and necessary that a record should be kept of what was accomplished in those four years of a most bloody and disastrous war, when responsible acts, often requiring the greatest personal coolness and courage, were performed by men of our profession, who had been wholly untrained in the art and requirements of actual warfare. It must be noted, also, that they quietly fulfilled the most arduous, delicate and responsible duties unaccompanied by the ordinary expedients which are resorted to to incite and cheer the soldier; they were men who it was not deemed necessary to stimulate by adventitious aids, by mention in the gazettes, by brevet ranks conferred, by commendations read at the head of regiments, or reports sent up to headquarters—when the battle ended and the records of victory or defeat were recited.

They stood in need of no such aids, artificial or natural. These were the men who would only be referred to—if fate so willed it—in the list of casualties; and even in grave official histories of the campaigns, it is seldom that the presence, acts or the self-sacrifices of the medical staff would be recorded. In proof of which, since the war, we have seen no statement regarding the position, the conduct or the services of the medical department of the army in the great contest in which they played a most essential, if not the most conspicuous part.

Nor did they ask or expect fame, either present or posthumous. For conscious that, as members of a noble profession, the special