The Photographic History of The Civil War: in ten volumes, Thousands of Scenes Photographed 1861-65, with Text by many Special Authorities, Volume 7: Prisons and Hospitals.
Francis Trevelyan Miller, Ed.

Supplies for the medical department in Washington, 1865

‘Glass with care’ is the label on the mound of boxes of medical supplies in the lower photograph. The elaborate organization of wagons, soldiers, clerks, buildings, and supplies shown in these two pictures was for the purpose not of making wounds but of healing them, not of destroying life but of preserving it. The place is Washington. In front of the supply depot guarded by three sentries and several officers is the rack used for tying horses. The street-car system in Washington had not yet developed. Because of the distances and mud no one walked who could avoid it. At the beginning of the war, each regimental surgeon was furnished with a suitable equipment for his regiment for field service in quantities regulated by the Supply Table. Later, when the regiments were brigaded and the regimental medical corps consolidated, the table was revised. The medical and surgical material available on the firingline was practically that carried by the surgeon in his case, known as the ‘surgeon's field companion,’ and by his orderly in the ‘hospital knapsack.’

‘Glass with care’

Supplies for the medical department in Washington, 1865