Civil War Surgeon

 

In reporting a past life memory of my own which happened a couple of years back. I am quite clear it does not prove anything to anyone but me, especially due to the unreliability of combat records.  Despite my current hesitation to talk about my own past lives, I will this time, since I suspect it will have benefit to others.

     Off and on over the years I had thought about how I almost never see anything that is “left-brained proof” of these past life readings being real, like names and dates. I had no proof except to the people I do them for—since they know things about themselves I do not previously know that the past lives readings reference. So I said aloud to my guides that I was ready to see some kind of "proof" that I was seeing real past lives. The guides had always said names and dates and the like were simply distractions from what was important. What happened to the person was what mattered--the experience--and history often writes untruths. 

    What comes to mind as I say that I asked for "proof" is a reminder to be careful what I wish for and how I word it. And I already knew that! So as I write this I am laughing at myself.

     A few days after I said that, I was working with a client named Jenny. She was lying on my treatment table when she turned her face to me and out-of-the-blue said, “I know I fought in the American Civil War and died there.” I replied that I had not been involved in that war, meaning I had no memory of fighting in that one. I was half in trance at the time since I was doing energy medicine for Jenny, as I go into a light trance to do that work. 


    Just as I said those words to her, my own open eyes were staring off into space while looking at the sage green wall behind the treatment table. Then instantly in my mind’s eye I  saw myself looking into a mirror shaving. I was out-of-doors and the mirror was hanging from a tree. I gasped. As I looked into the mirror I could see that I had a good-looking, well-shaped full beard which was slightly graying. I was shaving my cheeks above the beard with a straight razor. I had blue eyes, shoulder length loosely curling brown hair, and a Union uniform on with suspenders dropped off my shoulders. I was not of slight build, but muscular, strong and even a bit beefy. I knew I was not only an officer in his mid-forties, but a surgeon as well. I was a “saw-bones” as they called them because of the frequent amputations those unfortunate men were called to perform out in the field without the grace of anesthesia. These men were saving lives, but cutting on people without anesthesia is just torture to the compassionate heart. I jumped as I gasped, looked at Jenny, and said, “I was there! Oh my God, I was a field surgeon,” my heart sinking.

     Remembering it was Jenny’s session and not mine, I dropped it and went back to focusing on Jenny. I completed the full session. 

     The next morning, still half asleep, I tried an experiment. I sat in my chair with my green tea and asked to see what else I needed to know about being a Civil War surgeon. The day I had seen myself shaving turned out to be my last. That late morning, our field hospital was overrun by the "Johnny Rebs." I was in the middle of an amputation of the lower left leg of a fourteen-year-old soldier. I refused to leave him half-finished, and as the tent was being breached, I held out my right hand, between thumb and forefinger, with the scalpel in it sideways, the last three fingers up, palm outward—to indicate to the nearest soldier to stop. The last thing I saw was the blood-lust in his eyes as he pierced me through the lower part of my heart with a long spear-like knife mounted on the end of his rifle. I dropped to the ground. It took me about three minutes to die, gasping. Oddly, I did not feel sad or angry, but relieved as I floated up and out of my body. After I saw the end of that lifetime, I rested a minute and then opened my eyes. 

      Next I sat down at my desk, took a scrap of paper and pencil and said something to my guides like, okay, if I was a field surgeon in the Civil War, what was my name? I heard Davis and Evans. I wrote them both down. I was annoyed because they could not make up their minds which one of these was my last name.  But I continued in spite of my annoyance with them. Next I asked which state I was from, they said Indiana. Right. Indiana, sure. Why have I no interest in going to Indiana? I do not feel connected to Indiana at all. Silence. Next I asked, Infantry or Artillery? They answered Infantry.

     Then I turned on the computer, searched for a roster of people who served as surgeons in the Union in the American Civil War, and found Indiana in a book from the “Harvard Library Roster of Regimental Surgeons and Assistant Surgeons, in the Late War, with Their Service and Last-Known Post-Office Address”. Then I looked for entries in the infantry section. I found no one named Davis, so I kept going. When I got to the Indiana 69^th infantry section, under the “E’s” I found a man named Evans. First name: David; middle initial S. 

     They were not saying Davis and Evans. Lord in heaven, they were saying David S. Evans. Term of service was about four years—the entire war. He was reported killed in March of 1864. I closed my eyes, trying not to hyperventilate. This actually frightened me.

     Having accepted that what I had been doing all these years was real based upon the clients telling me how spot on I was about things, I was still unprepared that I would be given a full name and such detail as where he was from. 

     Over time, I “snapped to” about a lot of things. That lifetime explained why I get annoyed slightly when I see one of those goofy-looking beards so many men had during that era. Everything shaved but the neck, chin and lower jaw, for example. Odd shaving patterns just look stupid to me to this day. Why on earth would I care about that? I believe this comes from the opinion of a long dead man who prided himself on having the handsome, full, well-groomed beard of a gentleman.  Those strangely shaped beards just looked like the mark of punks to Dr. Evans. 

     That lifetime also explains why every time I see someone with seriously injured arms or legs on television shows I silently think, now, how would I do that amputation if I were there and it were needed? I do not know where to cut the skin to do that amputation to leave enough skin, or the locations of the blood vessels, nor where to cut the muscles, how much to leave and how much to remove, nor do I have the tools or knowledge to cut the bone correctly so that it does not splinter. There is so much I do not know about amputations that I feel slightly vulnerable. But since I will never do an amputation in this lifetime, I also have not bothered to learn these skills nor read about them, either.  These are passing thoughts as I see films or watch television. The prevalent part of me, Lois, knows that I do not need that skill. And I had never said anything to anyone about this odd thought process which occasionally flitted across my mind like a cloud passing before remembering that past life, either. I just let it pass like many other odd thoughts.

     Yes, yes, I know. That was why I was laughing earlier: this is clearly not proof to anyone but me. And a detailed search of the records might not agree fully with what I had seen, since records during wartime are often seriously compromised. However, I had said to my guides that I was ready to get some specific details like names, dates, or locations and check them against the historical record to see proof that a past life was real. And soon thereafter it happened – I got enough information to convince me that it was real. 

     The guides do have a sense of humor. Never let it be said they do not! What I failed to say was that a second person should be involved in this so that someone besides me would know—so that I would have a witness that the experience unfolded for me as I said. But the guides gave me what I asked for. Now I have further confirmation, for myself at least, that what I see in my readings is real. I take the risk of reporting this to others because it is interesting to me and might be to others, plus there are important lessons here for those who are ready for them.