Walter Reed Army Medical Center's Role in the Civil War

Walter Reed Army Medical Center (WRAMC) turns 100 this year. The Walter Reed Army Medical Center originally began when the reservation of 43.27 acres was announced in War Department General Orders No. 83, W.D., dated May 2, 1906, as a result of deeds obtained from George W. Madert and his wife, in 1905. Walter Reed Army Hospital was established in 1909. WRAH named after Major Walter Reed by the Army Medical Corps in recognition for his greatness in controlling the spread of Yellow Fever.

Many people recognize the name Walter Reed Army Medical Center as the famous military hospital in Washington, D.C. What many people may not know is that Walter Reed campus is more than a hospital. The Walter Reed campus has a Civil War history. The campus borders the historical neighborhood of Brightwood. As a new employee, you get a guide tour of the campus, and a lecture of the surrounding historical neighborhood. Administered by the U.S. Army, Walter Reed Army Medical Center is located on land where the Confederates positioned their lines during the Battle of Fort Stevens. Some of the open ground within the reservation is similar to the appearance of the terrain in 1864 on which the Battle of Fort Steven was fought.

The Walter Reed Army Medical Center (WRAMC) is located in an attractive Washington D.C. residential area, between Rock Creek Park and 16 th Street, Fern Street, Aspen and 14 th Street, Alaska Avenue, and Georgia Avenue, Northwest near the Maryland-D.C. boundary. Drive out of the 14th Street gate, and the street will take you through D.C. to the 14th Street Bridge into Virginia.

The Brightwood Historical Neighborhood, the site of the only Civil War battle to take place within the District is at the heart of a new Heritage Trail. Brightwood was farmland during the Civil War. The Heritage Trail's first sign is located at 14th and Jefferson Streets, NW. It then proceeds up Georgia Avenue and wind around Fort Stevens, ending at Van Buren Street, NW, one block south of Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Even before Emancipation, a free African American community developed in Brightwood as early as the 1820s.

The site occupied today by Walter Reed Army Medical Center saw considerable fighting in 1864 during Confederate Gen. Jubal Early's raid on Washington. The houses and orchards on the hill provided a haven for Rebel sharpshooters. According to the tour guide, one tulip tree in particular, which stood near present-day Delano Hall Building 12, was called the sharpshooters' tree. This is the tree the sharpshooter fired at President Lincoln, after he ascended Fort Steven's parapet. Although it survived the battle, it succumbed to an ice storm in 1920. A memorial plaque with two cannon balls marks the spot. A plaque, accompanied by two 100-pounder spherical shots fired from Fort Totten or Fort De Russy, marks the spot of a tulip tree that stood near where the Confederate sharpshooter had been.

The National Museum of Health and Medicine (NMHM), originally known as the Army Medical Museum (AMM), is a museum on the grounds of Walter Reed. A component of the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology (AFIP), the NMHM is a member of the National Health Sciences Consortium. Army Surgeon General William A. Hammond founded the AMM in 1862 and it became the NMHM in 1989. What's special about the museum are its Civil War exhibits, and the interactive exhibit autopsy of Lincoln. On display is the bullet fired from the Deringer pistol which ended the President's life, the probe used by the US Army Surgeon General to locate the bullet, pieces of Lincoln's hair and skull, and the surgeon's shirt cuff, stained with Lincoln's blood. The AMM was established during the American Civil War as a center for the collection of specimens for research in military medicine and surgery. There are exhibits showing Civil War medical care, including a horse drawn ambulance reproduction. During and after the war, AMM staff took pictures of wounded soldiers showing effects of gunshot wounds as well as results of amputations and other surgical procedures. Some of the exhibits are graphic, but the museum is visited by many schools. If taking your children, you have to decide which exhibits are appropriate for them.

National Museum of Health and Medicine, 6900 Georgia Avenue, NW, Washington, DC 20306

http://nmhm.washingtondc.museum/

This link will take you to a printable map of the campus: http://www.wramc.amedd.army.mil/Visitors/visitservice/visitwramc/PostMap/Printable_WRAMC_Map.pdf

Resources:

Battleground National Cemetery-1825 Georgia Avenue, NW

Then: Portion of field during the Battle of Fort Stevens

Now: National Cemetery - http://www.nps.gov/archive/cwdw/btcemet

Fort Stevens-13th and Quackenbos Streets, NW

Then: Part of the Defenses of Washington

Now: Preserved and interpreted by the National Park Service -http://www.nps.gov/archive/rocr/ftcircle/

History Office: Walter Reed Army Medical Center

6900 Georgia Ave. NW, Washington, D.C. 20307-5001

Phone: 202-782-3329

http://www.culturaltourismdc.org/info-url_nocat2536/info-url_nocat_show.htm?doc_id=70262

http://www.culturaltourismdc.org/info-url_nocat2536/info-url_nocat_show.htm?doc_id=44243

http://www.nps.gov/history/history/online_books/civilwar/hrs1-7.htm

Lincoln Cottage (located on the grounds of Soldiers' and Airmen's Home)

Rock Creek Church Road and Upshur Street, NW

Then: Summer White House for Lincoln where he watched the war in DC.

Now: Museum and historic site-www.lincolncottage.org/

National Museum of Health and Medicine

6900 Georgia Avenue, NW

Then: Army Medical Museum studying field medicine

Now: Museum on the grounds of Walter Reed Army Medical Center-http://nmhm.washingtondc.museum/

Soldiers' and Airmen's Home

Rock Creek Church Road and Upshur Street, NW

Then: Asylum for old and disabled veterans

Now: Part of the Armed Forces Retirement Home-http://www.afrh.gov/afrh/wash/whistory.htm