Womans Work in the Civil War | Page 4

North--Preparations for the great campaign-- Her labors at Belle Plain, Fredericksburg, White House, and City Point-- Return to Washington--Appointed "General correspondent for the friends of paroled prisoners"--Her residence at Annapolis--Obstacles--The Annapolis plan abandoned--She establishes at Washington a "Bureau of records of missing men in the armies of the United States"--The plan of operations of this Bureau--Her visit to Andersonville--The case of Dorrance Atwater--The Bureau of missing men an institution indispensable to the Government and to friends of the soldiers--Her sacrifices in maintaining it--The grant from Congress--Personal appearance of Miss Barton. 111-132
HELEN LOUISE GILSON.
Early history--Her first work for the soldiers--Collecting supplies-- The clothing contract--Providing for soldiers' wives and daughters-- Application to Miss Dix for an appointment as nurse--She is rejected as too young--Associated with Hon. Frank B. Fay in the Auxiliary Relief Service--Her labors on the Hospital Transports--Her manner of working-- Her extraordinary personal influence--Her work at Gettysburg--Influence over the men--Carrying a sick comrade to the hospital--Her system and self-possession--Pleading the cause of the soldier with the people-- Her services in Grant's protracted campaign--The hospitals at Fredericksburg--Singing to the soldiers--Her visit to the barge of "contrabands"--Her address to the negroes--Singing to them--The hospital for colored soldiers--Miss Gilson re-organizes and re-models it, making it the best hospital at City Point--Her labors for the spiritual good of the men in her hospital--Her care for the negro washerwomen and their families--Completion of her work--Personal appearance of Miss Gilson. 133-148
MRS. JOHN HARRIS.
Previous history--Secretary Ladies' Aid Society--Her decision to go to the "front"--Early experiences--On the Hospital Transports--Harrison's Landing--Her garments soaked in human gore--Antietam--French's Division Hospital--Smoketown General Hospital--Return to the "front"-- Fredericksburg--Falmouth--She almost despairs of the success of our arms--Chancellorsville--Gettysburg--Following the troops--Warrenton-- Insolence of the rebels--Illness--Goes to the West--Chattanooga--Serious illness--Return to Nashville--Labors for the refugees--Called home to watch over a dying mother--The returned prisoners from Andersonville and Salisbury. 149-160
MRS. ELIZA C. PORTER.
Mrs. Porter's social position--Her patriotism--Labors in the hospitals at Cairo--She takes charge of the Northwestern Sanitary Commission Rooms at Chicago--Her determination to go, with a corps of nurses, to the front--Cairo and Paducah--Visit to Pittsburg Landing after the battle-- She brings nurses and supplies for the hospitals from Chicago--At Corinth--At Memphis--Work among the freedmen at Memphis and elsewhere-- Efforts for the establishment of hospitals for the sick and wounded in the Northwest--Co-operation with Mrs. Harvey and Mrs. Howe--The Harvey Hospital--At Natchez and Vicksburg--Other appeals for Northern hospitals--At Huntsville with Mrs. Bickerdyke--At Chattanooga-- Experiences in a field hospital in the woods--Following Sherman's army from Chattanooga to Atlanta--"This seems like having mother about"-- Constant labors--The distribution of supplies to the soldiers of Sherman's army near Washington--A patriotic family. 161-171
MRS. MARY A. BICKERDYKE.
Previous history of Mrs. Bickerdyke--Her regard for the private soldiers--"Mother Bickerdyke and her boys"--Her work at Savannah after the battle of Shiloh--What she accomplished at Perryville--The Gayoso Hospital at Memphis--Colored nurses and attendants--A model hospital-- The delinquent assistant-surgeon--Mrs. Bickerdyke's philippic--She procures his dismissal--His interview with General Sherman--"She ranks me"--The commanding generals appreciate her--Convalescent soldiers vs. colored nurses--The Medical Director's order--Mrs. Bickerdyke's triumph--A dairy and hennery for the hospitals--Two hundred cows and a thousand hens--Her first visit to the Milwaukee Chamber of Commerce--"Go over to Canada--This country has no place for such creatures"--At Vicksburg--In field hospitals--The dresses riddled with sparks--The box of clothing for herself--Trading for butter and eggs for the soldiers-- The two lace-trimmed night-dresses--A new style of hospital clothing for wounded soldiers--A second visit to Milwaukee--Mrs. Bickerdyke's speech--"Set your standard higher yet"--In the Huntsville Hospital--At Chattanooga at the close of the battle--The only woman on the ground for four weeks--Cooking under difficulties--Her interview with General Grant--Complaints of the neglect of the men by some of the surgeons-- "Go around to the hospitals and see for yourself"--Visits Huntsville, Pulaski, etc.--With Sherman from Chattanooga to Atlanta--Making dishes for the sick out of hard tack and the ordinary rations--At Nashville and Franklin--Through the Carolinas with Sherman--Distribution of supplies near Washington--"The Freedmen's Home and Refuge" at Chicago. 172-186
MARGARET ELIZABETH BRECKINRIDGE. By Mrs. J. G. Forman.
Sketch of her personal appearance--Her gentle, tender, winning ways-- The American Florence Nightingale--What if I do die?--The Breckinridge family--Margaret's childhood and youth--Her emancipation of her slaves-- Working for the soldiers early in the war--Not one of the Home Guards-- Her earnest desire to labor in the hospitals--Hospital service at Baltimore--At Lexington, Kentucky--Morgan's first raid--Her visit to the wounded soldiers--"Every one of you bring a regiment with you"--Visiting the St. Louis hospitals--On the hospital boats on the Mississippi-- Perils of the voyage--Severe and incessant labor--The contrabands at Helena--Touching incidents of the wounded on the hospital boats--"The service pays"--In the hospitals at St. Louis--Impaired health--She goes eastward for rest and recovery--A year of weakness and weariness--In the hospital at Philadelphia--A ministering angel--Colonel Porter her brother-in-law killed at Cold Harbor--She goes to Baltimore to meet the body--Is seized with typhoid fever and dies after five weeks illness. 187-199
MRS. STEPHEN