U.S. GENERAL HOSPITAL AT CLEVELAND was a pavilion-style, 320-bed Civil War Army hospital, located on Univ. Hts. (see TREMONT) in Brooklyn Twp. from 1862-65. Construction began on 14 Nov. 1862, opposite Camp Cleveland, located on 3.76 acres of property apparently leased to the government by its owner, Cleveland merchant and real-estate investor SILAS S. STONE. John R. McClurg, U.S. Army surgeon-in-charge, announced the hospital was officially opened on 13 Jan. 1863. Approximately 3,020 Union soldiers convalesced there during its existence, most from Ohio regiments, although a good number were from non-Ohio units and two Confederate prisoners were also treated. Only enlisted men and noncommissioned officers were admitted, as commissioned officers were treated in separate hospitals, as were black enlisted soldiers. Of the patients, 103 were the victims of gunshot wounds that had necessitated amputations, resections, or excision, usually in hospitals closer to the front. Eighty-nine patients died, mostly from diarrhea, measles, and pneumonia. The dead were buried in West Side (now MONROE ST.) CEMETERY. Some were reinterred after the war in WOODLAND CEMETERY. Most patients survived disease and infection to be sent back to duty or to be discharged from the army for medical reasons. Soldiers not able to return to their original units were put into an invalid corps called the Veteran Reserve Corps to serve as guards wherever needed or as stewards and male nurses in general hospitals. The hospital closed on 17 July 1865.
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