Roderick Stewart

I was attracted to this biography too find out more about the Canadian doctor and innovator that had a Detroit office on Selden early in his career. Part rootless roué, he invented the Bethune rub shears still in use today and was reckless in trying to advance surgical methods to fight the tuberculosis he himself suffered from. Some patients he thus saved; some died under his knife. As a budding socialist he was caught up in the proto-Communistic anti-fascist fervor of the early 1930s show more ending up in Madrid supporting the fight against Franco. There he developed frontline battlefield medicine techniques like mobile operating stations and blood services further developed by many services in WWII. This part of his career found him with Chinese defending against the Japanese invaders where his tireless and selfless activities led to his own death. show less

Bethune is a nation hero in China and recently, his work in Spain during the Civil War is also being acknowledged. A man with a strong social conscience, he was attracted to Spain to assist with his medical skills. He came up with the idea of collecting blood and transporting it close to the front lines where the wounded could receive a transfusion and have a better chance of surviving. A Spanish doctor had already come up with the same idea and had it working. When Bethune discovered the show more Spanish doctor's method was superior to his, he adopted it in the mobile blood transfusion trucks he built.

Bethune witnessed the tragic slaughter of civilians as they fled from Malaga to Almeria which is now considered to have been a greater war crime than the more famous bombing of Guernica. The book contains photos of that flight as well as many photos of Bethune and the transfusion vehicles in use during the war. show less