(Did
you know that ships are referred to with feminine pronouns like “she”
and “her”?)
The
ship was seized by Union forces in 1862, and she was repaired and
refitted to be a hospital ship. An operating room was installed, and
there were separate kitchen facilities for the medical staff and for
patients. Some rather up-to-date (for then) features included a steam
boiler for the laundry, bathrooms and water closets, an elevator, and
gauze window blinds to keep cinders and smoke away from patients.
Separate quarters were set up on barges for those with contagious
diseases.
You
may be picturing Red
Rover
as going up and down the Atlantic Coast, but actually she steamed her
way up and down the Mississippi River. The medical staff included 30
surgeons and male nurses plus four nuns, and the patients numbered
more than 2,000. The ship was commissioned on this date in 1862 and
was decommissioned in November of 1865.
By
the way, those four nuns that served as nurses made the Red
Rover
the first U.S. ship to have female nurses.
Nowadays...
One
of the most interesting things about touring the aircraft carrier the
U.S.S.
Midway
was the realization that it was like a small town, with everything a
town would need: restaurants and a church, recreation areas and a
hospital, a laundromat and a dentist's office.
With
3 to 10 thousand aboard an aircraft carrier, there is plenty to keep
the medical staff busy. The aircraft carrier USS
Dwight D. Eisenhower
has a staff of 40, and they can do everything from removing moles to
doing open-chest surgeries. Even though there is plenty of danger of
injury (the whole ship is made of metal, and airplanes are constantly
taking off and landing, and of course it is possible for a military
craft to be in or near war zones!) and of illness (in such close
quarters, keeping contagious diseases from becoming epidemics is
difficult), the medical staff spends most of its time with
preventative care.
Also
on this date:
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