href="@public@vhost@g@gutenberg@html@files@41432@[email protected]#the-sign-of-the-wooden-cross">The Sign of the Wooden Cross

THE TALE OF
A FIELD HOSPITAL

I

THE FIELD HOSPITAL

The Field Hospital, of which some account is given in these pages, was known as "No. 4 Stationary Field Hospital." The term "stationary" is hardly appropriate, since the Hospital moved with the column, and, until at least the relief of Ladysmith, it followed the Headquarters' camp. The term, however, serves to distinguish "No. 4" from the smaller field hospitals which were attached to the various brigades, and which were much more mobile and more restless.

At the commencement of the campaign the capacity of the Hospital was comparatively small. The officers in charge were Major Kirkpatrick, Major Mallins, and Lieutenant Simson, all of the Royal Army Medical Corps. These able officers--and none could have been more efficient--were, I regret to say, all invalided as the campaign progressed.

Before the move was made to Spearman's Farm the Hospital was enlarged, and the staff was increased by the addition of eight civil surgeons. It is sad to report that of these two died in the camp and others were invalided. No men could have worked better together than did the army surgeons and their civilian colleagues.

The greatest capacity of the Hospital was reached after the battle of Spion Kop, when we had in our tents about 800 wounded.

Some account of the nurses who accompanied the Hospital is given in a section which follows.

The Hospital was well equipped, and the supplies were ample. We carried with us a large number of iron bedsteads complete with mattresses, blankets, and sheets. These were all presented to the Hospital by Mr. Acutt, a generous merchant at Durban. It is needless to say that they proved an inexpressible boon, and even when the Hospital had to trust only to ox transport, all the bedsteads went with it.

The ladies of the colony, moreover, worked without ceasing to supply the wounded with comforts, and "No. 4" had reason to be grateful for their well-organised kindness.

The precise number of patients who were treated in the Hospital is no doubt recorded in the proper quarter, but some idea of the work accomplished may be gained from the fact that practically all the wounded in the Natal campaign--from the battle of Colenso to the relief of Ladysmith--passed through No. 4 Stationary Field Hospital. The exceptions were represented by the few cases sent down direct by train or ambulance from the smaller field hospitals.

II

FRERE CAMP

It was from Frere Camp that the army under General Buller started for the Tugela River, and the Hospital pitched its tents in that camp on the evening of Monday, December 11th, 1899. We went up from Pietermaritzburg by train. The contents were soon emptied out on the line, some little way outside Frere Station, and close to the railway the Hospital was put up. That night we all slept under canvas--many for the first time--and all were well pleased that we had at last arrived at the front.

Frere is merely a station on the line of rail which traverses Natal, and as it consists only of some three or four houses and a few trees it can hardly be dignified by the name of hamlet. Frere is simply a speck--a corrugated iron oasis--on the vast undulating plains of the veldt. These plains roll away to the horizon, and are broken only by kopjes and dongas and the everlasting ant-hills.

On the way towards Ladysmith are a few kopjes of large size, from any one of which the line of the Tugela can be seen, with the hills beyond, occupied by the Boer entrenchments,