Chapter XII: Home and Country (2)

Important Arrests at Alexandria.--Quite a sensation was produced in Alexandria on last Thursday evening by the arrest of some twenty-five or thirty alleged secessionists, who are charged with being concerned in a secret association for the purpose of giving aid and comfort to the rebels. The conspiracy, it seems, was organized under the pretended forms of a relief association, and comprised all the treasonable objects of affording relief to the enemy. It is further stated that a fund was obtained from rebel sympathizers for the purpose of supporting the families of soldiers in the service of the “Confederate States,” on the identical plan of the noble Relief Commission of Philadelphia, established with such different motives. It has also been engaged in the manufacture of rebel uniforms, which were distributed among the subordinate female associations. The purpose of the plotters was also to furnish arms and munitions of war. A considerable quantity has been discovered packed for shipment, consisting of knapsacks and weapons. Letters were found acknowledging the receipt through the agency of the association of rifles and pistols in Richmond....

Among the papers secured are many letters implicating persons heretofore unsuspected.

The parties were brought to this city on Friday, and lodged in the old Capital prison. As they passed along the avenue, under the guard of soldiers, they appeared to be quite indifferent as to their fate and the enormity and baseness of the crime with which they are charged. The majority of them presented a very respectable appearance, and were followed to jail by an anxious crowd of men and boys.

Clara Barton asked her father his opinion of the feasibility of her getting to the front. He did not discourage the idea. He knew his daughter and believed her capable of accomplishing what she set out to do. Moreover, he knew the American soldier. He felt sure that Clara would be protected from insult, and that her presence would be welcome to the soldiers.

Having thus been favorably introduced to Governor Andrew, and her story of the secret operations of Secessionists near Washington having been confirmed, she felt that she could write the Governor and ask him for permission to go to the very seat of war. She had been sending supplies to Roanoke, and Newbern, North Carolina, and she wished very much that, as soon as her father should have passed away, she might be permitted to go with her supplies and perform her own work of distribution. From her father’s bedside she wrote the following letter to Governor Andrew:

NORTH OXFORD, Mar. 20, 1862

TO HIS EXCELLENCY JOHN A. ANDREW, Governor
of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

Governor Andrew will perhaps recollect the writer as the lady who waited upon him in company with Hon. Alexander De Witt, to mention the existence of certain petitions from the officers of the Massachusetts Regiments of Volunteers, relating to the establishment of an agency in the City of Washington.

With the promise of Your Excellency to “look after the leak” came a “lessening of my fears,” and the immediate discovery of the truly magnificent rebel organization in Alexandria, and the arrest of twenty-five of the principal actors, including the _purchasing committee_, brought with it not only entire satisfaction, but a joy I had scarce known in months. Since September I had been fully conscious in my own mind of the existence of something of this kind, and in October attempted to warn our Relief Societies, but, in the absence of all proof, I must perforce _say_ very little. I should never have brought the subject before you again, only that I incidentally learned that our excellent Dr. Hitchcock has taken back from Roanoke other papers relating to the same subject, which will doubtless be laid before you, and, as I have an entirely different boon to crave, I find it _necessary_ to speak.

I desire Your Excellency’s permission to go to Roanoke. I should have proffered my request weeks earlier, but I am called home to witness the last hours of my old soldier father, who is wearing out the remnant of an oak and iron constitution, seasoned and tempered in the wild wars of “Mad Anthony.” His last tale of the Red Man is told; a _few_ more suns, and the old soldier’s weary march is ended,--honorably discharged, he is journeying home.

With this, my highest duties close, and I would fain be allowed to go and administer comfort to our brave men, who peril life and limb in defense of the priceless boon the fathers so dearly won.

If I know my own heart, I have none but right motives. I ask neither pay nor praises, simply a soldier’s fare and the sanction of Your Excellency to go and do with my might, whatever my hands find to do.

In General Burnside’s noble command are upwards of forty young men who in former days were my pupils. I am glad to know that somewhere they have learned their duty to their country, and have come up neither cowards nor traitors. I think I am safe in saying that I possess the entire confidence and respect of every one of them. For the _officers_, their signatures are before you.

If my request appear unreasonable, and must be denied, I shall submit, patiently, though sorrowfully, but trusting, hoping better things. I beg to submit myself

With the highest respect,

Yours truly

CLARA H. BARTON

John A. Andrew was one of the great war governors. Massachusetts is one of the States that can always be proud of the record of its chief executive during the dark days of the Civil War. He responded promptly to Clara Barton’s appeal. On the day of her father’s funeral she received the following letter from Governor Andrew:

COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS
EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENT
BOSTON, March 24th, 1862

MISS CLARA H. BARTON,
North Oxford, Mass.

I beg to assure you, Miss Barton, of my cordial sympathy with your most worthy sentiments and wishes; and that if I have any power to promote your design in aid of our soldiers I will surely use it. Whenever you may be ready to visit General Burnside’s division I will cheerfully give you a letter of introduction, with my hearty approval of your visit and my testimony to the value of the service to our sick and wounded it will be in _your_ power to render.

With high respect I am,

Your ob. servant

JOHN A. ANDREW

This letter seemed a practical assurance that Clara Barton was to be permitted to go to the front. She had the Governor’s virtual promise, conditioned, of course, upon recommendations from proper authorities, and she thought she had sufficient influence with the surgeon, Dr. Hitchcock, to secure the required recommendation. Through an official friend she took up the matter with Dr. Hitchcock, but in a few days his letter to the Doctor came back to Clara by way of the Governor. Dr. Hitchcock did not believe that the battle-field was a suitable place for women. Among Clara Barton’s papers the letter to Dr. Hitchcock is found bearing his comment and the Governor’s brief reference with which the letter was forwarded to Clara Barton. This closed, for the time being, her prospect of getting to the front:

BOSTON, March 22, 1862

DR. HITCHCOCK,
DEAR SIR:

A friend of mine, Miss Clara H. Barton, is very desirous of doing what she can to aid our sick and wounded men at Roanoke, or Newbern, and I to-day presented a letter from her to Governor Andrew asking that she might be sent there by the State. Governor Andrew said he would confer with you relative to the matter. I presume Miss Barton will write to you. She has been a resident of Washington and the petitions you brought for me to present to the Governor were for her appointment as an agent at Washington. She now desires to go to the Burnside expedition.

I need not say that she would render efficient service to our sick and wounded and would not be an encumbrance to the service.

Truly yours

J. W. FLETCHER

This letter bears written on its back these endorsements by Dr. Alfred Hitchcock and Governor Andrew:

I do not think at the present time Miss Barton had better undertake to go to Burnside’s Division to act as a nurse.

ALFRED HITCHCOCK

March 25th, 1862.

Respectfully referred for the information of Miss Barton.

J. A. ANDREW

March 25, /62.

Old Captain Stephen Barton died at last, aged almost eighty-eight. The entries in Clara Barton’s diary on these days are brief and interesting:

_Thursday, March 20, 1862._ Wrote Governor Andrew, and watched by poor, suffering Grandpa. Sent a letter to Irving by the morning mail.

_Friday, March 21, 1862._ At 10.16 at night, my poor father breathed his last. By him were Misses Grover, Hollendrake, Mrs. Vial, David, Julia, and I.

_Saturday, March 22, 1862._ David and Julia went to Worcester. Mrs. Rich here. Sent letters to Irving, Judge, Mary, Dr. Darling.

_Sunday, March 23, 1862._ Call from Deacon Smith.

_Monday, March 24, 1862._ Mrs. Rich went to Worcester for me. Left a note for Arba Pierce to make a wreath for poor Grandpa’s coffin.

_Tuesday, March 25, 1862._ At two P.M., commenced the services of the burial, Rev. Mr. Holmes of Charlton officiating. House and grounds crowded. Ceremony solemn and impressive. At evening Cousin Jerry Stone came and brought me a letter from Governor J. A. Andrew.

This was all she found time to write in the diary. Of the letters she wrote to her cousin, Corporal Leander A. Poor, relating to her father’s death, one has been recovered:

NORTH OXFORD, March 27th, 1862
Thursday Afternoon

MY DEAR COUSIN LEANDER:

Your welcome second letter came to me this noon--doubtless before this you have learned the answer to your kind inquiry, “How is Grandsire?” But if not, and the sentinel post is mine, I must answer, “All is well.” Down under the little pines, beside my mother, he rests quietly, sleeps peacefully, dreams happily. The old soldier’s heavy march is ended, for him the last tattoo has sounded, and, resting upon the unfailing arms of truth, hope, and faith, he awaits the “reveille of the eternal morning.”

“Grandsire” had been steadily failing since I came home. For more than thirty days he did not taste a morsel of food, and could retain nothing stronger or more nourishing than a little milk and water--for over ten of the last days not that, simply a little cold water, which he dared not swallow. And still he lived and moved himself and talked strongly and sensibly and wisely as you had always heard him. Who ever heard of such constitutional strength?

You will be gratified to know that he arranged all his business to his entire satisfaction some days previous to his death. After being raised up and writing his name, he said to me, “This is the last day I shall ever do any business; my work in this world is done.”

He remained until Friday, the 21st [of March], sixteen minutes past ten o’clock at night. He spoke for the last time about five o’clock, but made us understand by signs until the very last, when he straightened himself in bed, closed his mouth firmly, gave one hand to Julia, and the other to me, and left us.

Clara Barton’s hopes of going to the front received a severe disappointment when Governor Andrew returned Dr. Hitchcock’s communication with the refusal to endorse her application. But she was nothing if not persistent. Almost immediately after her receipt of the Governor’s letter, she began again seeking to bring influence to bear on a Massachusetts captain (Denney), whose wife she had come to know. In this she gives more detail of the so-called “leak” in stores, which had been sent more or less recklessly for the benefit of troops, and without the prepaying of express charges. An organization of Confederate sympathizers had been formed to purchase these goods from the express company, and slip them through the lines. In some way she had found this out, and so as to be morally certain of it before the exposure and arrest of the conspirators, she had relied upon advance information that she possessed of this system to commend her to Governor Andrew, and he was, evidently, favorably impressed. But she encountered the red tape of the surgeons who were not willing that she should go to the battle-field.

No immediate results came from her continued efforts to secure permission to go to the front. She still remained in New England through the month of May, but in June returned to Washington and remained there until the 18th of July.

She had already been receiving supplies from her friends in New Jersey as well as from Massachusetts. She now went to Bordentown and from there to New York, Boston, Worcester, and Oxford. This journey was made for the purpose of ensuring a larger and continuous supply of provisions, for she had now obtained what she long had coveted, her permission to go to the front. Authority, when it finally came, was direct from the Surgeon-General’s office, and it gave her as large liberty as she could well have asked. The following passes and authorizations were all issued within twenty-four hours. Just how she obtained them, we do not know. In some way her persistence triumphed over all official red tape, and when she secured her passes they were practically unlimited either as to time or destination. The following are from the official records:

SURGEON-GENERAL’S OFFICE
July 11, 1862

Miss C. H. Barton has permission to go upon the sick transports in any direction--for the purpose of distributing comforts for the sick and wounded--and nursing them, always subject to the direction of the surgeon in charge.

WILLIAM A. HAMMOND
Surgeon-General, U.S.A.

SURGEON-GENERAL’S OFFICE
WASHINGTON CITY, July 11, 1862

SIR:

At the request of the Surgeon-General I have to request that you give every facility to Miss Barton for the transportation of supplies for the comfort of the sick. I refer you to the accompanying letter.

Very respectfully
R. C. WOOD, A.S. Gen’l.

MAJOR D. H. RUCKER, A.Q.M.
WASHINGTON, D.C.

OFFICE OF DEPOT QUARTERMASTER
WASHINGTON, July 11, 1862

Respectfully referred to General Wadsworth, with the request that permission be given this lady and friend to pass to and from Acquia Creek on Government transports at all times when she may wish to visit the sick and hospitals, etc., with such stores as she may wish to take for the comfort of the sick and wounded.

D. H. RUCKER, Quartermaster and Col.

H’D QRS. MIL. DIV. OF VA.
WASHINGTON, D.C., July 11, 1862

The within mentioned lady (Miss Barton) and friend have permission to pass to and from Fredericksburg by Government boat and railroad at all times to visit sick and wounded and to take with her all such stores as she may wish to take for the sick, and to pass anywhere within the lines of the United States forces (excepting to the Army of the Potomac), and to travel on any military railroad or Government boat to such points as she may desire to visit and take such stores as she may wish by such means of transportation.

By order of Brig.-Gen’l Wadsworth, Mil. Gov. D.C.

T. E. ELLSWORTH, Capt. and A.D.C.

INSPECTOR-GENERAL’S OFFICE, ARMY OF VIRGINIA
WASHINGTON, D.C., August 12, 1862

No. 83

To Whom it may Concern:

Know ye, that the bearers, Miss Barton and two friends, have permission to pass within the lines of this army for the purpose of supplying the sick and wounded. Transportation will be furnished by Government boat and rail.

By command of Major-General Pope
R. JONES, Asst. Inspector-General

It is said that when Clara Barton finally succeeded in getting permission to go to the front, she broke down and burst into tears. That is possible, but her diary shows no sign of her emotion. Nor is it true, as has been affirmed, that, as soon as she received her passes, she rushed immediately to the front. Her self-possession and deliberate action at this moment of triumph are thoroughly characteristic of her. Instead of going to the front, she went to New Jersey and New England, as has already been intimated. She had no intention of going to the front until she had assurance of supplies which she could take with her and could continue to receive. She was no love-lorn, sentimental maiden, going with unreckoning and hysterical ardor into conditions which she did not understand. She was forty years old, and she knew what hospitals were. She also knew a good deal about official red tape and the reasonable unwillingness of surgeons to have any one around the hospital unless she could earn her keep. With a pocket full of passes which she now possessed, she could go almost anywhere. To be sure, it was necessary to get special passes for particular objects, but in general all she had to do was to present these blanket credentials, and particular permission for a specific journey was promptly forthcoming. Indeed, she seldom needed that when her lines of operation were definitely established, but at the beginning she took no chances. Among the other friends whom she gained while she was procuring these certificates was Assistant Quartermaster-General D. H. Rucker. He proved an unfailing friend. Never thereafter did she go to him in vain with any request for transportation for herself or her goods.

Her first notable expedition in supplies started from Washington on Sunday, August 3, 1862, just as the people were going to church. Frequent mention has been made of the fact that this occurred on Sunday, and some incorrect inferences have been drawn from it. Clara Barton had too large a conception of the sacredness of her task to have waited until Monday for a thing that needed to be done on Sunday. On the other hand, she had too much religion of her own, and too much regard for other people’s religion, to have chosen deliberately the day and hour when people were going to church as that on which she would mount a loaded truck and conspicuously take her journey to the boat. She began her arrangements to go to Fredericksburg on Wednesday, July 30th, as her diary shows. But it was Friday afternoon before her arrangements were complete, including the special passes which she had to procure from General Polk’s headquarters. Saturday she started, but the boat was withdrawn, and it was due to this delay that she rode on top of her load on Sunday morning. She was taking no chances concerning her load of provisions; she knew that her welcome at the front and her efficiency there depended upon her getting her supplies there as well as herself. So she climbed over the wheel and sat beside the mule-driver as he carted her provisions to the dock. The boat conveyed her to Acquia Creek where she stayed all night, being courteously treated by the quartermaster. On Monday she went on to Fredericksburg, where she visited the general hospital, located in a woolen factory. There she witnessed her first amputation. The next day she visited the camp of the 21st Massachusetts. She distributed her supplies, and found where more were needed. Returning, she reached Washington at six o’clock Tuesday night. The next few days she had conferences with the Sanitary Commission, and suggested some improvement in the methods of supplying the hospitals.

She found the Sanitary Commission quite ready to coöperate with her, and obtained from them without difficulty some stores for the 8th and 11th Connecticut Regiments. She took time to write the story of her visit to Fredericksburg, and to secure its full value in additional supplies.

This was the way she spent her time for a full month after she secured her passes. She visited the friends who were to supply her with the articles she was to need; she visited the front and personally oversaw the method of distributing supplies; she placed herself in sympathetic relationship with the Sanitary Commission, whose work was next of kin to her own, and she wrote letters that were to bring her a still larger volume of resources for her great work. A more businesslike, methodical, or sensible method of procedure could not be imagined than that which her diary and letters disclose.

How she felt about going to the front at this time is finely set forth in a letter to her cousin, Corporal Leander A. Poor, who was sick in a hospital at Point Lookout, Maryland, and whom she succeeded in getting transferred to a hospital in Washington. She did not expect to be there when he arrived, for she was committed to her plan of getting to the front. Not that she expected to stay continuously; it was her purpose to come and go; to get relief directly where it was needed, and to keep her lines of communication open. This letter shows that she labored under no delusion concerning the difficulties of transportation. She was going in with her eyes open.

WASHINGTON, D.C., Aug. 2, 1862
Saturday P.M.

OH, MY DEAREST COUZ:

Can you believe it! that this afternoon’s mail takes an order from the Surgeon-General for you to report in Washington (provided the state of your health will permit)? I have just seen the order written.

You are to report to Dr. Campbell, Medical Director, and he is to assign you to some hospital. Now I want you assigned near me, but am not certain that I can influence it in the least,--but I’ll try! I can tell you the ropes and you can help pull them when you go to report.

At the Medical Director’s, I have an especial friend in the person of Dr. Sheldon, one of the _chargés des affaires_ of the Institution. I will acquaint him with the facts before your arrival either by a personal interview or a note, and then, when you go to report to Dr. Campbell, see first, if possible, Dr. Sheldon, and ask him if he can assist you in getting assigned to some hospital near me (7th Street) or in the vicinity of the Post-Office, he knows my residence, having called upon me.

My choice would be the “Armory Square,” a new hospital on 7th Street a few rods the other side of the Avenue from me, on the way to the Arsenal, you will recollect, just opposite the Smithsonian Institute, on the east side of 7th. This is designed as a model hospital, but perhaps one difficulty will be that it is intended more exclusively for extreme cases, or desperately wounded who can be conveyed but little distance from the boat. There are in it _now_, however, some very slight cases, some whom I visit every day. The chaplain, E. W. Jackson, is from Maine, near Portland,--and I would not be surprised if more Maine men were in charge there, too.

After this I have not much choice in any of the hospitals near me. E Street Church is near, and so many of the churches, and perhaps being less in magnitude they are less strict. I don’t even know if you will be allowed to see me before making your report to the Medical Director, and there is one bare possibility that I may be out on a scout when you arrive. Lord knows the condition of our poor wretched soldiers down in the army; all communication cut off to and from, they must be dying from want of care, and I am promised to go to them the first moment access can be had, but this would not discourage you, for I should come home again when the poor fellows were a little comfortable.

I am not certain when you can come, probably not until some Government boat comes up; one went down yesterday, and if I had had your order _then_, I should have come for you, but to start in one now after this I might miss you, as they only go some once a week or so.

All sorts of rumors in town,--that we are whipping the rebels, they are whipping us, Jackson defeated, Pope defeated. But one thing I do suppose to be true, viz., that our army is isolated, cut off from supplies of food, and that we cannot reach them with more until they fight their way out. This is not generally believed or understood, but your cousin both understands and believes it. People talk like children about “_transporting supplies_” as if it were the easiest thing imaginable to transport supplies by wagon thirty miles across a country scouted by guerrilla bands. Our men _must_ be on part rations, tired and hungry, fighting like tigers, and dying like dogs. There! Doesn’t that sound impatient. I won’t speak again.

Of course you will write me instantly and tell me if you are able to come, and when as nearly as possible, etc., etc.

I will enclose $5.00 lest you may need and not have.

Your affectionate Cousin

CLARA H. BARTON

Washington, D.C.

Thus did Clara Barton at her father’s death-bed consecrate herself to a work more difficult than any woman had at that time undertaken for the relief of suffering caused by the war. Other women were equally brave; others, equally tender in their personal ministrations; but Clara Barton knew the difficulties of transportation and the awful agonies and loss of life endured by men through neglect and delay and the distance of the hospital from the battle-field. She was ready to carry relief right behind the battle lines. She had not long to wait for her opportunity.

[6] From James Russell Lowell’s second series of “Biglow Papers,” then appearing in the _Atlantic_.

[7] A reference to Julia Ward Howe’s “Battle Hymn of the Republic,” then new.