Manuscript copy of Transport par Chemins de fer des Blesses et Malades Militaires. Deuxieme Rapport.

Hospital train. An elegant manuscript copy, probably made for presentation, of a report on the organisation of the French military's mobile hospital system by the doctor in charge of it. The text was published in book form by O. Doin of Paris in 1902.

Dr. Paul Redard (d. 1917) was 'a well-known orthopaedic surgeon of Paris' who 'took his doctor's degree in 1879... He was the author of monographs on torticollis, spinal curvature, and orthopaedic gymnastics; of a textbook of orthopaedic techniques and of an atlas of radiography. He held appointments in connexion with the State railway service of France and was chief physician to the opera'. He died in 1917 of pneumonia contracted in the course of his work in military hospitals (obituary, British Medical Journal, March 24, 1917).

This was the second of Redard's reports on the railway system, the first having been published in 1885. The contents include ten photographs mounted on card that illustrate the hospital railway carriages, including the exteriors, linen store, pharmacy, dining room, kitchen, bunks for the wounded, and doctors' quarters, as well as 26 technical diagrams.

Manuscript; folio (30.5 x 20 cm); 69 pages of manuscript text in black ink, rectos only, 10 photographs and 1 prnted illustration mounted on card, 26 plans and technical drawings of which 8 are printed in blue, spotting to the edges of the text block, contents lightly toned with the occasional light spot, photograph 9 detached from backing and loosely inserted; contemporary red half morocco, marbled sides and endpapers, titles to spine gilt, 5 raised bands, some wear and scuffing of the boards, primarily the edges, and a little dust soiling, very good condition.