washington and medicine 2

Washington insisted on clean camps—“An advancement of the time that likely saved lives during the war,” Dr Brunsman said—and he understood the basic needs of his soldiers, especially regarding cleanliness and the importance of maintaining supply lines.

“Though the germ theory of disease was still in the future, Washington was aware of the linkage between better hygiene and nutrition and improved health,” said W. Scott Schroth, M.D., associate dean for administration and associate professor of medicine in the School of Medicine and Health Sciences. “To the extent that he was able, he tried to support these efforts for his troops.”

His shrewd decision to inoculate American soldiers from smallpox was an example of that knowledge, Dr. Brunsman said. In the 1770s, smallpox, a common childhood disease in Europe, wasn’t as widespread in the colonies and was both deadly and highly contagious in American camps. The method of inoculating people against smallpox—by taking samples of the disease from pustules of victims and putting it into healthy people—was one of the most intensely debated medical issues of the Colonial era.

Washington, who contracted smallpox in 1751 while on a journey to Barbados and understood the disease firsthand, began inoculating the Continental Army in 1777, methodically infecting, quarantining and treating soldiers for the proper amount of time so they would build up immunity without spreading the disease.

“This removes smallpox as a factor for the rest of the war,” Dr. Brunsman said. “I think it’s another example of the scientific side of Washington benefitting his soldiers. He was really at the forefront of knowledge at the time about medicine.”