Marrow of Tragedy Part 3

     Smallpox, being an extremely powerful disease that was common in the 19th Century, one would expect there to be some concern among the officers of the Army. The fact that these men turned soldiers would be in close quarters with one another would raise enough concern to take some sort of action to ensure that smallpox could not contaminate the troops. According to Humphrey's, "The Union Army required that men be vaccinated on admission, or show a vaccination scar or evidence of previous smallpox" (282); Even with these precautions, "Smallpox spread through the Union troops and from there into the Confederate Army" (282). Humphrey's explains that "this rule was rarely observed, at least in the enthusiastic opening days of the war" (282). I find it very interesting that the Union Army was willing to let troops with this disease fight for them, when one soldier carrying the disease could potentially do more harm than the Confederate Army could. I believe that the decision to overlook the potential soldiers carrying the disease was influenced by the war strategy of this era. The probability of an enlisted solider to die was much higher than it is today. The most senior military officers probably figured that a bullet would kill a solider before a disease would.