Chapter I: Front Matter

ADELAIDE·W·SMITH
INDEPENDENT
VOLUNTEER]

GREAVES PUBLISHING COMPANY
NEW YORK
MCMXI

Dedication

To the
Boys in Blue
1861-1865;

and to those brave women who, with smiling faces and breaking hearts, sent them forth to save their country and their homes, while they themselves toiled in fields and elsewhere, waiting to welcome home too many who never returned; and to that band of heroic devoted women, many of whom left luxurious homes for the discomforts and privations of hospital life, and died, self-sacrificing patriots of the war, this true story is affectionately dedicated.

A. W. S.

COPYRIGHT 1911
BY
ADELAIDE W. SMITH

YORK PRINTING COMPANY
YORK, PA.

Contents

CHAP. PAGE

Foreword 9

I. A View of the Situation 11

II. Long Island College Hospital, Brooklyn 21

III. Bedloe’s Island, Now Liberty 33

IV. The Great Manhattan Fair of the
United States Sanitary Commission 44

V. New England Rooms 53

VI. Arms and Trophy Department of the
Sanitary Commission Fair 59

VII. Unique Case of William Mudge 71

VIII. The Start for the Front 78

IX. Some Patients 84

X. Experiences at Point of Rocks 90

XI. Depot Field Hospital and State
Agencies at City Point, Virginia 96

XII. City Point, Virginia,--A Day in The Army 116

XIII. Dorothea Dix 125

XIV. An Unexpected Ride 131

XV. Two Fiancées 139

XVI. The Story of My Pass 144

XVII. Thanksgiving, 1864, Under Fire at
Dutch Gap, Virginia 148

XVIII. Domestic Life in Camp and Other
Incidents 160

XIX. Love in Camp 167

XX. New York State Agency 185

XXI. A House Moving 191

XXII. The Last Parade of Confederate Prisoners 197

XXIII. Our First Sight of Petersburg 200

XXIV. Preparing for a Visit to Richmond, the
Capital of the Lost Confederacy 209

XXV. Recollections of Lincoln 216

XXVI. Recent Letter from Dr. Mary Blackmar
Bruson 229

XXVII. Last of City Point 234

XXVIII. Washington and New York State Agency 240

XXIX. Old Capitol Prison, Washington, D. C. 247

XXX. The Last Act in My Drama at Washington 253

XXXI. Transportation Home 260

Foreword

This story, devoid of literary pretensions, is a simple narration of day by day experiences, as they came to me, during five years of volunteer work in hospitals of the Civil War.

At the risk of some slight repetition, it has been thought best to include “Recollections of Lincoln” and “Love in Camp” practically as they were when published separately.

I wish to express my high appreciation and thanks for the confidence and encouragement of those friends who thought the book should be written that the younger generations may know something of the work done by women during the war.

To the Rev. W. M. Brundage, of Brooklyn, I am especially indebted for practical suggestions that have made the publication possible.

With some limitations, during two summers, I betook myself to the unique Seventh-day-Baptist University town of Alfred, New York, where the story was written on the picturesque campus, in a pure atmosphere free from all disturbing elements.

It has been a labor of love and pleasure to review the old scenes, replete though they were with suffering and death, for the thought of the comfort we were able to give to the “Boys” and the remembrance of their gratitude remain. In no other benevolent work of my life was the reward so immediate and so inspiring as in this ministration. I have given real names and literal words as nearly as possible, except in cases where there was something unpleasant to relate; and I may truly add that, even to be young again, I would not have missed those years of incessant care and anxiety, given in the hope of saving brave soldiers for their country and their homes.

A. W. S.