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The Civil War Hospital Ships that Invented Modern Trauma Care
Description
The first hospital ship in U.S. Navy history wasn't purpose-built—it was a captured Confederate steamer transformed into one of the Civil War's greatest innovations. Commissioned in 1862, the Red Rover featured an operating room, a patient elevator, advanced ventilation, and even hundreds of tons of ice to help fight disease.
But her greatest legacy was the people aboard. On Christmas Eve 1862, three Catholic nuns became the first women ever to serve on a U.S. Navy vessel. They worked alongside formerly enslaved women, including Ann Bradford Stokes, who later became the first American woman awarded a military pension for her own military service. Together, they cared for more than 2,400 wounded and sick patients—Union and Confederate alike.
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