Carole Divall

There is a perception of military surgeons of the Napoleonic period as butchers who lost more of their patients than they saved.  The statistics of the 2/30th Regiment at Quatre Bras and Waterloo challenge this perception, however.

The 2nd battalion 30th Foot in square with the 73rd at Waterloo

Although there can be no doubt about the six officers and thirty-six NCOs and privates killed during the three-day campaign, the number of wounded remains problematic.  The battalion surgeon, James Elkington, recorded in his journal that 202 officers and men were wounded.  Edward Macready thought the figure was 220.  This discrepancy can be explained by Macready including in his count even those who received what today we would classify as wounds requiring nothing more than first aid, whereas Elkington only included those he sent to the general hospital.

A list produced at the end of 1815 reduced the number of men specifially given as wounded to 156, although others were returned as in the general hospital, Brussels, and most of these seem to have been wounded.  Even if we take this minimum number, however, the figures for recovery remain surprisingly good.  Only twenty-six men died of wounds.  Of these, ten died on the sixth day after the battle, the point when infection became life-threatening.  This reminds us that lack of antiseptics posed a problem which even the most competent surgeon could not overcome.

The kinds of wounds which were survivable are also interesting.  The discharge papers of men of the 2/30th sometimes merely refer to “wounded at Waterloo”, but in  sixty-five cases more detail is given.  The date of discharge is also significant.  A man discharged in 1815 or 1816 had obviously been incapacitated by his wound (or wounds), while those men discharged in 1817 or later had made a better recovery.

With regard to the terminology in the table below it should be noted that a “gunshot wound” results from cannon fire, whereas “musket shot” is precisely what it says.

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