Approval of Pensions … by race, region, and period … 1865-1906

Figure 2 — Approval of pensions for Civil War veterans, by race, region, and period: United States, 1865-1906

“Blacks did relatively better after the law was liberalized; however,this gain was confined almost entirely to Blacks living in the North. Gains for Blacks in the South were modest, and approval was still lower for this group than for any other. Things also got considerably worse for White Union Army veterans living in the South: their pension approval rate during the postliberalization period was 10 percentage points lower than in the preceding period.”

Sven E. Wilson, PhD. “Prejudice & Policy: Racial Discrimination in the Union Army Disability Pension System, 1865-1906,” American Journal of Public Health, Volume 100: S56-S65.

[Note: The table above is on page S62 of the 10-page article — Leslie]

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Disparities in the Union Army Disability Pension System, 1865-1906

Figure 1. Percentage of pension enrollment among living Civil War veterans, by race, illness or wounded status, and year: United States 1865-1906

“The Union Army disability pension was an early experiment in colorblind social policy…..At the program’s peak in 1893, 41.6% of all federal budget expenditures were being paid out to military veterans…. [The author] used original data sources on over 40,000 Union Army veterans to compare systematically the treatment of Black and White veterans by the pension system.”
Sven E. Wilson, PhD. “Prejudice & Policy: Racial Discrimination in the Union Army Disability Pension System, 1865-1906,” American Journal of Public Health, Volume 100: S56-S65.

[Note: You might be particularly interested in the description of the pension application process involving disability on page two of the 10-page article — Leslie]

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Stethoscopes

Civil War-era monaural stethoscope in the collection of the National Museum of Civil War Medicine, Frederick, Maryland

Binaural stethoscope circa 1870 in the collection of the National Museum of Civil War Medicine, Frederick, Maryland

Note: The images above appeared in “Historical Implications of a Failing Heart” by Richard A. Reinharton on the National Museum of Civil War Medicine blog on June 19, 2017.

“Museum From Home: A Brief History of the Stethoscope,” (4:51) Royal College of Physicians, November 12, 2020.
Senior curator Lowri Jones, senior curator at the Royal College of Physicians presents a brief history of the stethoscope which includes examples from the collection.

The Stethoscope. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1964.
Four-page biography of Renee Laennec who invented the stethoscope published for the Medical Museum of the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology

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“Hicks U.S. Genl. Hospital, Baltimore, Md.”

The catalogue record for this item at the Library of Congress

“[Many hospitals] were built on a pavilion model, with separate, single-story, ward-size buildings arranged in rows or a semicircle and designed for good ventilation. These hospitals had additional buildings for kitchens and other supportive services.”
Glenna R. Schroeder-Lein. The Encyclopedia of Civil War Medicine (Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 2008), page 140.

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“The Influenza Pandemic in Virginia (1918-1919)”

This Board of Health Sign is in the collection of the Virginia Museum of History and Culture.

Some Civil War veterans and their family members were still alive during World War I and the Spanish flu pandemic.

“In 1918–1919 a new and deadly type of influenza spread across the United States and around the world. It raged through Virginia from the autumn of 1918 through the spring of 1919, spreading through cities, small towns, isolated rural areas, and military camps. By the time it waned, the epidemic had claimed the lives of at least 16,000 Virginians. The virus, which probably originated in Kansas, was brought to Virginia by military personnel arriving in the state to take ships to Europe, where World War I (1914–1918) was being fought.”
To read the complete article . . .
Addeane Cartwright. “The Influenza Pandemic in Virginia (1918-1919),” Encyclopedia Virginia (accessed December22, 2020)

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