Studies in American History 
299 
will elapse. Meanwhile the wounded must suffer immensely. So it was 
at Donelson and Pittsburg. Indiana has at least twenty-four regiments 
before the enemy. I propose to send at once to each of them two addi- 
tional surgeons, and respectfully request authority from you to do so. 
I regard this as an absolute necessity.^®® 
P. H. Watson, assistant secretary of war, replied: “You 
have authority to send to each of the Indiana regiments on 
the field in Tennessee, two additional surgeons.”^®® Compe- 
tent surgeons were immediately appointed to stay with regi- 
ments for any length of time, not only in Tennessee, but also 
in Kentucky.^®^ Requests for permission to send medical aid 
became quite common in 1863 and 1864;^®^ seventy additional 
surgeons were dispatched to Indiana regiments.^®® They 
were gladly received by the men in the field and did good 
service during the rest of the war.^®^ 
When some of these surgeons were sent to the field there 
was no provision for their pay except thru the Sanitary Com- 
mission. So much money was being expended from that fund 
that it was necessary, as well as expedient, to have them paid 
by the War Department if possible.^®® Morton asked Sena- 
tor Wright to “urge this upon the Secretary of War. All 
important, will save the lives of hundreds of soldiers.”^®® 
When Morton telegraphed to the War Department June 14, 
1862, on this subject, he received word that the matter had 
been referred to the Paymaster-General, who said that “The 
Pay Department can only pay military officers authorized by 
some statute, and the law organizing the volunteer forces 
Ibid., I, 351, and Appendix, 845 ; Morton to E. M, Stanton, April 21, 1862, 
Official Records, Series III, Vol. II, 24 ; General Telegrams, III, 172. 
P. H. Watson to O. P. Morton, April 21, 1862, Terrell, Report, I, Appendix, 
346 : Official Records, III, 24 ; General Telegrams, III, 173. 
^61 General Telegrams, III, 176, 177, 253 ; Terrell, Repo^'t, I, 350-352. 
^^-Indianapolis Daily Journal, January 30, 1863; Documentary Journal, 1865, II, 
78, 79 ; Madison Courier, October 26, 1862 ; Terrell, Report, I, 351 ; Private Despatches, 
XVI, 69, 76, 79, 118, 202, 203, 204, 205. During- 1862 and 1863 "there was hardly a 
single general engagement that did not require the services of special surgeons, nurses 
and means of relief ; and they were furnished by our State. . . .” Terrell, Report, 
I, 350. 
163 Foulke, Life of Oliver P. Morton, I, 166 ; Indianapolis Daily Journal, January 
7. 1863. 
164 Terrell, Report, I, 351. “The health of the regiment (36th at Murphreesboro) is 
about the average. . . . The superior sanitary condition is due to the efficiency of the 
recently appointed Assistant-Surgeons.” Rev. A. W. Sanford, chaplain, in Indianapolis 
Daily Journal, August 18, 1863. 
Indianapolis Daily Journal, March 11, 1863, 
O. P. Morton to Joseph A. Wright, April 26, 1862, General Telegrams, III, 182. 
