Aleksandr D. Lyubushkin

Postgraduate Student of the Department of History and Archeology

Tula State Lev Tolstoy Pedagogical University

(Tula, Russia)

DOI: https://doi.org/10.22405/2712-8407-2023-1-44-59

Abstract. The article discusses the process of organizing and implementing the evacuation of the wounded during World War I in the home front of Tula Province. The study is based on published sources and documents from the State Archive of Tula Oblast. The main task of the rear provinces at the beginning of the war was to deploy a network of medical institutions with a certain number of beds to provide evacuated soldiers with inpatient medical care. The country's evacuation system, based on the principle of "taking everyone out", had already by autumn 1914 resulted in the home front being overcrowded with wounded arriving from the battlefield. In this regard, the rear provinces were not guided in their evacuations by their real capacities, but by the task of receiving all the wounded sent to the home front. By consolidating the efforts of society and the state, represented by the Zemstvo and municipal unions, the military department, and other actors who were active in opening medical centres and deploying beds on the home front, such efforts were realised. The study establishes that hospitals and infirmaries operated by Zemstvo and municipal unions, as well as by the military department, formed the basis of the entire bed capacity of the evacuated soldiers in Tula Province and a number of neighbouring rear provinces. Geographically, in the early stages of the war, these institutions were located mainly in the provincial and district capitals of the province, due to transport accessibility, resources for opening new medical centres, and the rate at which inpatient beds were being created. The author concludes that at the initial stage of the war (1914 – 1915) the number of hospital beds available in Tula Province for evacuation, and the rate of its growth did not match the number of the incoming wounded.
Keywords: World War I, Tula Province, evacuation, the wounded, hospital.

Full text of the article (PDF)

For citation: Lyubushkin, AD 2023, ‘«To Receive... in Full...»: Organization of the Evacuation System of the Wounded in Tula Province During World War I’, Tula Scientific Bulletin. History. Linguistics, issue 1 (13), pp. 44–59, http://doi.org/10.22405/2712-8407-2023-1-44-59 (in Russ.)

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