Rensselaer Union, Volume 3, Number 41, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 July 1871 — Musket Balls in the Human Body. [ARTICLE]

Musket Balls in the Human Body.

A NUMitEK of curious cases of the progress of musket balls from the place where they are first lodged have been observed by military surgeons. We have heard of a remarkable case where the musket ball struck the forehead above the nose, and having divided it into two halves, one half went round beneath the skin od the right side, and the other on the left, advancing iu contact with thef skull. We do notask our readers to believe the poetical edition of this fact, that the two half bullets met again behind, after having performed the circuit of the head in opposite directions, and advancing with a slightly diminished force, united and killed an unfortunate man who stood in their way; but the fact of the splitting of the bullet, and the advance of each half in opposite directions is unquestionable. The singular progress of a musket bullet from the forehead to the throat has been recorded liy Dr Fielding. At the first battle of Newbury’, 1641, in the time of the Cromwellian civil war, a mulical gentleman was shot near the right eye. The skull was fractured at the place; but though the surgeon could see the pulsation of the brain beneath the wound, yet the bullet had turned onbne side andcould not be discovered. Various bones were discharged from the wound, the mouth and the nostrils. At the time of the second battle of Newbury the wound healed and could not be kept open; but about twelve years afterward, when the doctor was riding in a eold, dark night, he felt a pain about the “ almonds of the ear,” which occasioned a partial deafness. Having stopped his ear with wool, he was surprised one day in March, 1070, by a sudden pull or crack in his ear, when all that side of his cheek hung loose as if it had been paralytic, anil a nard knot was felt under the ear. Various tumors now appeared about the throat, and in August, 1072, the bullet was taken out of the throat.— Fraser's Magazine.