Civil War medicine was not very effective at all.
In fact more people died from disease than actual fighting.
The doctors during that time could not cure much for people who became sick.
The North had a small advantage over the South when it came to medical technology, but only slightly.
They were both equally bad.
Medicine given to patients was so poor that it usually caused more problems for them than actually helping them.
Soldiers did everything they could to keep themselves healthy because they knew getting sick or wounded would be virtually a death sentence.
There were a lot of bad treatments going around during the Civil War.
One in particular was Mercury.
This was seen as somewhat of a cure all and it was given to patients for virtually any problem they had.
The reason this medicine was bad simply was because it was poisonous to people.
It is known to cause brain damage, tooth loss, and digestive problems.
Of course not every was horrible.
Civil War medicine such as chloroform was actually very helpful to people.
It was nothing more than an anesthetic but it allowed surgeons to put their patients to sleep while they operated on them.
It also allowed patients to be operated on without having to go through the painful agony of the operation.
Mercury was plentiful on both sides during the war.
The primary tool of the surgeon was the bone saw.
I think it's pretty easy to imagine what this little piece of technology did for people.
It sawed bones.
If a soldier was shot in an arm or leg that usually meant bone saw time.
There was a simple reason why there were so many amputations during the war.
Infection would usually sent in soon after a soldier was wounded, the only way to prevent this from happening was to amputate.
The majority of all battlefield surgeries during the war were amputations.