After Philippi, nineteen years old James Edward Hanger becomes the first amputee of the Civil War

After the battle at Philippi, James Edward Hanger, a 19 year-old Washington College sophomore and recruit in the Virginia infantry, became the war's first amputee when a Union surgeon removed his shattered right leg just below the hip. Returning home on a prisoner exchange, he developed an artificial limb - "the Hanger Leg."  He patented it in 1863 and developed the company that still operates as Hanger Prosthetics & Orthotics.  (By John Osborne)  
Source Citation
Jennifer David McDaid, "'How a One-Legged Rebel LIves' - Confederate Veterans and Artificial Limbs in Virginia," in Katherine Ott, David Serlin, and Steven Mihm, eds., Artificial Parts, Practical Lives: Modern Histories of Prosthetics (New York: New York University Press, 2002), 119. 
    Date Certainty
    Exact
    Type
    Battles/Soldiers
    How to Cite This Page: "After Philippi, nineteen years old James Edward Hanger becomes the first amputee of the Civil War," House Divided: The Civil War Research Engine at Dickinson College, https://hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu/index.php/node/38295.