Page 258 - Conflitti Militari e Popolazioni Civili - Tomo II

760 XXXIV Congresso della CommIssIone InternazIonale dI storIa mIlItare • CIHm

During the years of the civil war, there were various moments when the increase in the
number of soldiers hospitalized meant that there were less civilians treated, or vice-versa. We
can give two examples of these moments:
• From May to December 1832;
• From October 1834 to June 1835
In the first case, we underline the months from June to September, with two visible con-
sequences:
• A drastic decrease in the number of civilian patients: the hospital was literally invaded
by the soldiers;
• The high number of hospitalizations during the month of June and the fact that the
situation of war destabilized the way the hospital normally functioned: from here on
the diagnostics referent to soldiers practically disappeared.
When it came to women patients, the problem would worsen: the women’s hospitaliza-
tions were always reverse to the number of soldiers, showing that they were not very recep-
tive to sharing this clearly “invaded” hospital space.
The exceptions to this dynamic were the summer of 1833 and 1834. During this period
there was a general increase of military and civilian patients, including women, and mortality
rates arose rapidly. It seems that they tried their best to help everyone they could, by every
means possible. This could of course be due to cholera, introduced in the Iberian Penin-
sula when D. Pedro’s mercenary soldiers from other European countries, like Belgium and
France, occupied the city of Oporto .
15
According to Oliveira Martins and Rui Cascão , after the siege of Oporto, when the ab-
16
solutist soldiers who took part in it went back to their homes, cholera rapidly spread through-
out the countryside from the city, attaining for example the Douro regions .
17
Unfortunately, soldier’s hospitalizations were so high that the registry of the diagnostics
ceased. But it’s possible that these passed through Vila Real and carried the illness. the con-
centration of troops linked to the lack of public and personal hygiene increased the risk of
contamination of the public water sources - it is known that the ingestion of water contami-
nated with human excrements is the most common source of contamination .
18
At the time of the last peak of soldier hospitalizations, during the winter of 1834 and the
first semester of 1835, the hospital received a lot of foreign militaries. Ninety nine of these
individuals were part of the liberal army and among them we find various nationalities such
as Germans, Belgians, Dutch, Italians, Polish and French, among others.

ConClusIon

After what we have seen, it is clear that the obligation imposed on the Portuguese public
hospitals to receive soldiers prevented civilians’ medical assistance to take place. the pre-
sented case study, the Divina Providência hospital during the Peninsular War and the Portu-

15 Vincent, 1988: 43.
16 Oliveira Martins, 1996: 291-29; Cascão, 1998: 371.
17 Cascão, 1998: 371.
18 Fauci, Anthony S: Chapter 149.