Sketches of the campaign in northern Mexico : in eighteen hundred forty-six and seven / by an officer of the First Regiment of Ohio volunteers.

84 ~IMORT'ALITY AT CAIMARGO.
swamps or pools of stagnant water, left from the overflow of
the San Juan.
General Taylor, though busied with the many important arrangements upon which his subsequent success would depend,
yet frequently found time to visit the hospitals, and cheer
their inmates with kind and sympathizing words. In a
communication to the adjutant general, dated Camargo,
Sept. 3d, 1846, he says, " I have used every effort to extend
the hospital accomodations and the medical force, but the
service is suffering greatly in this latter particular. There
has been great sickness and mortality in some of the volunteer regiments. Great numbers are taken into the several
general hospitals, and' no exertion is spared to ameliorate
their condition." The deficiency of medical officers here
alluded to, was seriously felt in many regiments. But "6 the
laws of the land2," said the surgeon general, in reply to General Taylor's complaint of the scarcity of surgeons, a" awarded
two medical officers to a full regiment of 750 men,"9 and as
there were more than that number serving with the Army of
Occupation, ergo, the complaint was groundless, and the
surgeons in the field were censurable for not periforming
their duty. Our regiment was fortunate in securing at the
onset two skillful surgeons, and in being generally concentrated. But there were others, which, being divided and
sub-divided for garrison and escort duty, often suffered sadly,
in consequence of what the surgeon general asserted to be
a military propriety, and the customs of the service."9 It
* "I have given all in the way of medical aid which military propriety, and the
customs of the services in like cases, and the wants of the army seem to require;