black & white photo of several nurses and bed-ridden patient in a large tented room

Tent Ward, 1898

Tent Wards were used at various times throughout MGH history. They served as temporary quarters during hospital reconstruction, as isolation wards during seasonal epidemics, and as overflow accommodations for war and disaster victims. This particular photograph shows the inside of a Tent Ward erected in the hospital yard during the Spanish-American War to receive sick and disabled soldiers suffering from malaria and typhoid fever.