In the first few chapters of this book is a sad story of mismanagement at the start of the Civil War brought about by the lack of an effective system of finding the wounded on the battlefield and of a hospital system whereby they could be properly cared for. The military personnel for the north that gathered in the wounded at first were simply volunteers from various units of the army, almost wholly untrained in medical work. Many of the physicians at this time were volunteers from civil life who came and went more or less at their own convenience. Civilian teamsters, hired to drive ambulances, ran away or broke into the liquor supplies and behaved abominably, refusing to give water to the wounded, refusing to put the wounded in ambulances, and in some cases even going through the pockets of their helpless passengers. From this "frightful state of disorder" ....