The ship sailed on September 29th. Because troop space H-8 was deemed unfit for occupancy by reason of inadequate ventilation, troops quartered there were moved on the 30th to other compartments, causing congestion in many spaces. All available bunks in the sick bay were filled by army sick before the morning of September 30th. Arrangements were then made to empty F room section 3, port side, containing 200 standees. These bunks were filled within a few minutes with sick men picked up from the decks. When this space was found to be insufficient E room section 2, starboard side, 415 bunks, was vacated (October 1st), and the occupants sent down to H-8 regardless of improper ventilation. On October 3d, the port side of E room section 2, 463 bunks, was vacated by the Army guard, those sick in F. H. S. 3 were moved up to E. R. S. 2, and the guard sent below to be scattered wherever they could find space. Thus, on the night of October 3d, there was, beside the sick bay, a ward on E-deck capable of bunking 878 men. As the bunks are arranged four in a tier, one above the other, the top bunk could not be used for the sick, except in emergencies, because nurses could not climb up to them nor could sick men climb down to go to toilets. The Navy medical officers confined their efforts mostly to those in the sick bay spaces, while all the sick quarters below were turned over to the army medical officers. The army chief surgeon, Colonel Decker, and two of his juniors became ill on October 1st, leaving but eleven army doctors to hold sick call, treat patients below, and care for about thirty nurses and twenty officers who were ill in rooms. The navy medical officers stood watches in E. R. S. 3 at such times as they could be spared from the sick bay work, and relays of army nurses were assigned to duty below, with the pneumonia cases in the isolation ward, with sick officers in the officer’s ward, and with sick nurses and officers in staterooms. In fact every available medical officer, nurse and hospital corpsman was utilized to the extreme of endurance. Below, in the E-deck ward, every possible appliance for the care of the sick was furnished to the army surgeons on duty. The commissary officer placed at our disposal stewards, cooks and mess men, and furnished just the kind of food required, in the best possible fashion. The Medical Department of the ship owes, and I wish here to acknowledge, a great debt of gratitude to the Commissary Department, and to Paymaster Farwell and Chief Commissary Steward Flowers, especially, for their co-operation in this matter, the success with which they gave comfort and aid to the sick, and removed from our shoulders the always worrisome burden of feeding men unable to eat regular diet. COURSE OF THE EPIDEMIC This was influenced materially by these main factors: First, the widespread infection of several organizations before they embarked, and their assignment to many different parts of the ship.