ABSTRACT
Historical analysis of the American Civil War illustrates how addiction to medication prescribed to relieve physical suffering develops when the drug provides relief from psychological suffering and emotional anguish many soldiers face war. During the American Revolutionary War, opium was cultivated in colonial territories to meet medical needs of American soldiers. Through the world opium trade, fostered by the Opium Wars, opiate narcotics had become readily available to soldiers, civilians, and the medical community. Civil War physicians frequently dispensed opiates, and opiate-based medications continued to be heavily dispensed. An unintended secondary effect of opiate use was the psychological relief it brought to those who used it. The need for pain relief and the desire for psychological relief can be appreciated through illustrating the interpersonal violence, brutal nature of injuries, and proliferation of morphine in the Civil War battlefield. The changes in Civil War brought to the pharmaceutical industry, including the patent medicine trade, contributed to the development of drug addiction.
