As the larger proportion of the army (in which we are told that there are not two thousand sound men) is coming into hospital—as there are therefore thousands of lives at stake—as, in a service where the future of the official servants is dependent upon the personal interest of one man, these cannot be expected to peril that future by getting themselves shelved as innovators.
I feel that this is no time for compliments or false shame; and that you will never hear the whole truth, troublesome as it is, except from one independent of promotion.…
I subjoin a rough estimate of what has been given out by me during one month—the whole at the “requisition” of the Medical Men—all of which I have by me (merely in order to substantiate the facts of the destitution of these hospitals).
Since the 17th December, we have received 3400 sick, and I have made no sum total as yet of what has been done for these new-comers by us—excepting for one corridor, which I enclose.
(1) Thus the Purveying is nil—that is the whole truth, beyond bedding, bread, meat, cold water, fuel.
Beyond the boiling en masse in the great coppers of the general kitchen the meat is not cooked, the water is not boiled except what is done in my subsidiary kitchens. My schedule will show what I have purveyed.
I have refused to go on purveying for the third Hospital, the Sultan's Serail[137]—the demands upon me there having been begun with twelve hundred articles, including shirts, the first night of our occupying it. I refer you to a List of what was not in store, and to a copy of one requisition upon me sent last letter.
(2) The extraordinary circumstance of a whole army having been ordered to abandon its kits, as was done when we landed our men before Alma, has been overlooked entirely in all our system. The fact is, that I am now clothing the British Army. The sick were re-embarked at Balaclava for these Hospitals, without resuming their kits, also half-naked besides. And when discharged from here, they carry off, small blame to them, even my knives and forks—shirts, of course, and Hospital clothing also. The men who were sent to Abydos as convalescents were sent in their Hospital dresses, or they must have gone naked.[225] The consequence is that not one single Hospital dress is now left in store, and I have substituted Turkish dressing-gowns from Stamboul (three bales in the passage are marked Hospital Gowns, but have not yet been “sat upon”). To purvey this Hospital is like pouring water into a sieve; and will be, till regimental stores have been sent out from England enough to clothe the naked and refill the kit.
I have requisitions for Uniform trousers, for each and all of the articles of a kit, sent in to me.
We have not yet heard of boots being sent out; the men come into Hospital half-shod.