The Civil War was the bloodiest war in United States history; it was a long four years in which roughly 600,000 people died, which was two percent of the population. More people died during this war than in all the following wars combined: the American Revolution, the War of 1812, the Mexican War, the Spanish-American War, World Wars I and II, the Korean War, Vietnam, and the Persian Gulf War. The soldiers had to train long and hard to prepare for this exhausting combat. One soldier from Connecticut, Philip W Hudson, wrote a letter articulating all the endless drills he had to do, the first one at 4:45 a.m., to lights out at 9:45 p.m. (Hudson B1). He explains how they are kept very strict and constantly drilling. The intended audience of this letter is Philips father which is clearly shown in the address of the letter. The reason this is significant is because it shows the strong relationship between soldiers and their families back home. Hudson told his father about his daily life and reassured his father of his well-doing. Unfortunately, after all this preparation, the soldiers fighting in the war had a one-in-four chance of dying. Oddly enough, twice as many soldiers died from disease than in combat (Reilly H1). Thus, t
here was a strong desire to support the troopers and help them stay as healthy as possible. It was obvious that something needed to be done about the continuous casualties. So, both sides, the North and South, worked on improving their medical care, but there were not too many knowledgeable people on that matter. This period is commonly referred to as the Middle Ages of American medicine. The few people who started off the war as surgeons did not have formal training in medicine; many did not know about bacteria and the causes of diseases. Every year, the understanding of medicine improved because of the increased ambition to lessen the number of deaths caused by illnesses. The term, medicine, is not what the general person may think of when first hearing it; there are many elements to consider to help determine who had the dominance. A few of those aspects consist of anesthesia, physical exams, transportation of infected soldiers, hospitals, sanitation, and treatment. Some may argue that neither side had an advantage over the other when it came to medicine, but there were many factors proving the North had a slight advantage: their performance of anesthesia, their easy-access medical supplies, and their superior treatment.