Model ambulance, of Baron Larrey, wood, from Royal Army Medical College, 1st half of 19th century

This is a model of the ‘flying ambulance’ invented in the 1790s by Dominique Jean Larrey (1766-1842). Named after the speed with which wounded men could be transported from the battlefield to field hospitals, the sheltered carriage was often used as a place to perform emergency surgery. Drawn by two or more horses, this two-wheeled carriage has space for two stretchered patients inside. Larrey also organised an ambulance corps of surgeons and orderlies and equipped them with first aid supplies.

Before Larrey’s invention, men treated their own wounds or lay in agony until after the battle.