Of the Wounds received in the Actions of April, 1782.
Loss in the Battle and from Wounds—Fatality of the locked Jaw—Treatment of it—Some Ships more subject to it than others—Different from other Cases of Tetanus—It is not cured by the Removal of the Part—It may come on after the Part is cured—Effect of Climate in producing it—Accidents from the Wind of a Ball—Accidents from the Explosion of Gunpowder—Means of preventing them—General Observations on Sores and Wounds.
Though surgery was not properly in my department, yet, having had a fair opportunity of collecting facts concerning this branch of practice, I thought it my duty to pay some attention to it.
The whole number of men wounded in the actions of April, 1782, amounted to eight hundred and ten.
Of these, sixty died on board before the end of the month, five in the course of the following month, and two in June.
There were ninety-seven wounded men sent to the hospital at Port Royal, of whom there had died twenty-one when the fleet left Jamaica on the 17th of July.
So that the whole loss of men in the battles of April, and their consequences, is as follows:
| Killed outright | 266 |
| Died of their wounds on board | 67 |
| Died of their wounds at the hospital | 21 |
| Total | 354 |
Of those who died on board, fifteen[124] were carried off with the Symptoms of the locked jaw; but of those sent to the hospital, only one. The reason that so few in proportion were affected with it in the hospital may have been, that none of the wounded were landed till near the end of the third week after the principal action. The danger of this symptom was then, in a great measure, past, though I have known it to take place in every period from the second or third day till the fourth week.
Only three men in the whole fleet recovered from this alarming complaint; and as it is interesting to know every thing relating to so desperate a symptom, I shall give a short account of each.