288 
A. A. HOLCOMBE. 
ARMY VETERINARY MEDICINE, 
ITS HISTORY ; THE PRESENT CONDITION OF THE ARMY VETERIN¬ 
ARY SURGEON ; HIS RIGHTS AS A REPRESENTATIVE OF A SCIEN¬ 
TIFIC PROFESSION AND WHAT IS REQUIRED BY THE GOVERN¬ 
MENT TO ESTABLISH AN EFFICIENT VETERINARY DEPART¬ 
MENT. 
By A. A. Holcombe, D.V.S., Veterinary Inspector U. S. A. 
To the President and members of the United States Veterinary 
Medical Association. 
Gentlemen :— I have the honor to submit to you, the repre¬ 
sentatives of the veterinary profession in America, in behalf of 
myself and army colleagues, a statement which I trust will ap 
peal to your sense of justice and secure for us your most able 
influence in effecting such changes in the Army Veterinary De¬ 
partment as shall prove conducive to the interests of the govern¬ 
ment and of veterinary science. 
HISTORY. 
The history of veterinary medicine in the [J. S. Army is 
one that, fortunately, cannot be written in full, owing to the 
scarcity of data on the subject; but that it is replete with the bar¬ 
barous practice of ignorant empirics needs no confirmation beyond 
the silent testimony offered by the many remaining victims of 
unnumbered vivisections. They are present, living monuments 
to the ingratitude of a nation that exacts from the brute a full 
complement of labor without vouchsafing in return that care for 
its physical welfare which is due to the one and advantageous to 
the other. 
Prior to the breaking out of the late civil war in 1861 there 
were but few mounted soldiery in the army, and in the organi¬ 
zation table no reference is made to the veterinary surgeon, and 
it seems that no provision was made for the care and treatment 
of sick animals in government service. According to the testi- * 
mony of old soldiers who served in the Dragoons, it fell to the 
lot of the shoeing-smith or farrier not only to adjust the shoes, 
but to attend also the sick and disabled and to superintend the 
