On the evening of the 20th, this restlessness increased; delirium set in, and early in the morning of the 22d he died.
The limb was examined after death, when the following appearances presented:—
Femoral artery intact. Femoral vein wounded, with more than half its caliber shot away. At about two inches from its origin there was a wound of the profunda artery, on which an aneurism, nearly the size of a pigeon’s egg, had formed, and passed upward through the wound made by the ball. The profunda vein was intact. The injured vessels having been removed for preservation, the bone was then cut down upon, when a fracture, nearly transverse, and not at all comminuted, was observed below the trochanters. No splitting of bone upward; downward its outer plate was slightly cracked, but nothing more. The preparation is in the museum of the Royal College of Surgeons.
Private James Ross, a lad of eighteen, was brought up from the trenches, on the morning of the 3d inst., having had his right leg blown off below the knee by a round shot. He had lost a very large quantity of blood before the tourniquet was applied, and was consequently so much collapsed that an operation was out of the question. He was therefore dressed and the tourniquets (two had been put on) removed. He never rallied, and died on the 12th, nine days after the receipt of the injury. No hemorrhage ever occurred, though all pressure had been removed from the artery.
R. V. DE LISLE,
Surgeon, 4th King’s Own Regiment.
Camp before Sebastopol, Sept. 14, 1855.
The following is worthy of publication, as showing the successful effects of strychnia, when carried to the extreme verge of propriety, in injuries of the spinal cord.
Sergeant William Aldridge, 46th Regiment, aged 39 years, during a sortie from Sebastopol, was knocked down in the trenches, and his back formed a bridge over which Russians and English passed. The result was serious injury to the spine, causing paralysis of the lower extremities and bladder. The pain was excruciating, and the patient could not be moved in bed for several weeks.
On the 4th of March, 1855, he was placed under my charge in the military hospital at Portsmouth, when he complained of great pain and tenderness along the spine, and incontinence of urine, together with wandering day dreams and insomnolency at night. Solution of the muriate of morphia ʒj was prescribed without any effect. (ʒj contains 1 gr.) The dose was gradually increased to ʒij of the solution.