At the request of the surgeon-general cer tain well-known medical colleges allied with hospitals gave special three months' courses for nurses' aids. These young women were to serve as anesthetists, laboratory assistants, nurses' helpers and, in emergency, ward nurses. There were, on 1 July 1918, 48,000 in training schools for nurses, and a campaign to recruit 25,000 student nurses was launched (July 1918), conducted under the auspices of the com mittee on nursing and women's committee of the Council of National Defense, with the co operation of the surgeon-general's office and the American Red Cross. • Ambulance The Ambulance Corps, which had in August 1918, 9,000 or 10,000 men with 80 sections serving behind the French, English and Belgian lines and 30 sections be hind the Italian trenches, with additional units in training at Allentown, Pa., was started at Allentown in May 1917, to meet the emergency needs of the French in response to an appeal by Marshal Joffre. One hundred sections were trained in driving ambulances, carrying litters and in first-aid treatment. Forty colleges sent men and there were soon 4,500 on hand. The service abroad absorbed the privately raised and financed automobile ambulance units manned by American volunteers. An ambulance section consisted of a captain or lieutenant command ing and 45 enlisted men. An officer of the Motor Transport Corps checked up on opera tion and maintenance. Hospital units of vari ous kinds came to Allentown for training prior to departure abroad. The camp became strictly medical, with men in training for all branches in this service, the men for the laboratory units, field hospital units and organization to conduct base hospitals being obtained princi pally from the medical training camps at Fort Oglethorpe and Fort Riley.
Hospital The men of the Hos pital Corps available for service with line organizations and with the sanitary train are designated in time of peace, and at the time of mobilization for war they are ready to join their respective commands. Each has the proper personal equipment and has been in structed as to first-aid treatment. Field equip ment is maintained at designated stations ready for use.
Sanitary Officers.— Medical officers in command of sanitary units attached to units of the line smaller than a division (the sanitary units being temporarily separated from direct headquarters control) report these units to the senior line officer in command.
The department surgeon is chiefly an ad visory officer, but in matters relating to activi ties of the sanitary service within his depart ment he acts in an administrative capacity, supervising the work of the department and examining and passing on reports. His watch fulness over sanitary conditions is constant and he immediately reports orally to the command ing officer as to remediable defects, with recom mendations. In mobilization camps physical examinations are made and recorded by the de partment surgeon and sanitary inspector and their assistants, who also vaccinate against smallpox and typhoid fever, and report the sick list to the company commander, making ap propriate records. Each mobilization camp for
State National Guard troops was in charge of an officer of the regular army. He had on his staff a camp surgeon, usually a medical officer of the regular army. Surgeons at ports of embarkation and at rest stations were the sani tary advisers of the commanding line officers in all matters pertaining to the Medical De partment. The Medical Department sees to it that all individuals and organizations in the army are furnished such equipment as pertains to the Medical Department, and such training in sanitary matters is given to both line troops and sanitary troops as is possible and as is ap propriate to each.
The regulations defining duties of medical officers contain the following: •While officers acting as technical advisers of their com manders are responsible for pointing out in sanitary conditions and making proper recom mendations for their correction, the direct re sponsibility rests with the commander. If, how ever, the commander authorizes the medical adviser to give orders in his name for the cor rection of defects, then the duties and respon sibilities of the latter are correspondingly in creased.° Contract Contract surgeons are not given commissions, hut they wear the uniform when on active duty. They are ex pected to give their entire time to the public service. Short-term contracts are made with graduates of reputable medical schools and long-term contracts with graduates and quali fied practitioners after examination. There are two forms of contract: $1,800 a year, and substandard, $75 a month with subsistence, mileage, etc. Of the 151 contract surgeons in the service (in September 1918) 34 were women.
Civilian In administrative of fices, supply depots and hospitals, there are civilian employees including clerks, messengers, watchmen, contract nurses, cooks, packers and laborers, those other than unskilled laborers be ing subject to civil service rules. Service vol unteered in emergency by individual civilian physicians, nurses, litter bearers, cooks et aL, is of ten accepted by the surgeon of any organiza tion operating independently, or by the com manding officer of a general hospital, with the consent of his commanding officer and under the authority of the surgeon-general.
The personnel of the Medical Department, and all other persons assigned to duty with that department, are collectively called sani tary troops. In time of war the Sanitary Serv ice includes (a) all persons serving in or em ployed by the Medical Department, including officers and men temporarily or permanently de tailed therein; (b) individuals whose voluntary service with the Medical Department is duly authorized, and (c) members of the Red Cross assigned to duty in the Medical Department The American Red Cross, of which the Presi dent of the United States is head, aids under an act of Congress, approved 24 April 1912 This organization is, as per its charter (Act of 5 April 1905), qa medium of communication between the people of the United States and their Army.° The Red Cross has its our organization, acting under the direction of the ranking medical officer of the unit.