Page images
PDF
EPUB

terman, the medical director, she took special charge of the diet of the amputation cases; and subsequently distributed the much needed supplies furnished by the Sanitary Commission to the soldiers in their lines.

When the camps at Harrison's Landing were broken up, and the army tranferred to the Potomac, she accompanied a ship load of the wounded in the S. R. Spaulding, to Philadelphia, saw them safely removed to the general hospital, and then returned to Maine, for a brief period of rest, having been absent from home about a year. Her rest consisted mainly in appeals for further and larger supplies of hospital and sanitary stores for the wounded men of Maine, who in the battles of Pope's campaign, and Antietam had been wounded by hundreds. She was successful, and early in October returned to Washington and the hospitals of northern Maryland, where she proved an angel of mercy to the suffering. When McClellan's army crossed the Potomac, she followed, and early in December, 1862, was again at the front, where she was on the 13th, a sad spectator of the fatal disaster of Fredericksburg. The Maine Camp Hospital Association had been formed the preceding summer, and Mrs. J. S. Eaton, one of its managers, had accompanied Mrs. Fogg to the front. During the sad weeks that followed the battle of Fredericksburg, these devoted ladies labored with untiring assiduity in the hospitals, and dispensed their supplies of food and clothing, not only to the Maine boys, but to others who were in need.

When the battles of Chancellorsville were fought in the first days of May, 1863, Mrs. Fogg and Mrs. Eaton spent almost a week of incessant labor, much of the time day and night, in the temporary hospitals near United States Ford, their labors being shared for one or two days by Mrs. Husband, in dressing wounds, and attending to the poor fellows who had suffered amputation, and furnishing cordials and food to the wounded who were retreating from the field, pursued by the enemy. One of these Hospitals in which they had been thus laboring till they were

completely exhausted, was shelled by the enemy while they were in it, and while it was filled with the wounded. The attack was of short duration, for the battery which had shelled them was soon silenced, but one of the wounded soldiers was killed by a shell.

In works like these, in the care of the wounded who were sent in by flag of truce, and the distribution to the needy of the stores received from Maine, the days passed quickly, till the invasion of Pennsylvania by General Lee, which culminated in the battle of Gettysburg. Mrs. Fogg pushed forward and reached the battle-field the day after the final battle, but she could not obtain transportation for her stores at that time, and was obliged to collect what she could from the farmers in the vicinity, and use what was put into her hands for distribution by others, until hers could be brought up. She labored with her usual assiduity and patience among this great mass of wounded and dying men, for nearly two weeks, and then, abundant helpers having arrived, she returned to the front, and was with the Army as a voluntary Special Relief agent, through all its changes of position on and about the Rapidan, at the affair of Mine Run, the retreat and pursuit to Bristow Station, and the other movements prior to General Grant's assumption of the chief command. In the winter of 1864, she made a short visit home, and the Legislature voted an appropriation of a considerable sum of money to be placed at her disposal, to be expended at her discretion for the comfort and succor of Maine soldiers.

At the opening of the great Campaign of May, 1864, she hastened to Belle Plain and Fredericksburg, and there, in company with scores of other faithful and earnest workers, toiled night and day to relieve so far as possible the indescribable suffering which filled that desolated city. After two or three weeks, she went forward to Port Royal, to White House, and finally to City Point, where, in connection with Mrs. Eaton of the Maine Camp Hospital Association, she succeeded in bringing one of the Hos

pitals up to the highest point of efficiency. This accomplished, she returned to Maine, and was engaged in stimulating the women of her State to more effective labors, when she received the intelligence that her son who had been in the Army of the Shenandoah, had been mortally wounded at the battle of Cedar-Run.

With all a mother's anxieties aroused, she abandoned her work in Maine, and hastened to Martinsburg, Virginia, to ascertain what was really her son's fate. Here she met a friend, one of the delegates of the Christian Commission, and learned from him, that her son had indeed been badly wounded, and had been obliged to undergo the amputation of one leg, but had borne the operation well, and after a few days had been transferred to a Baltimore Hospital. To that city she hastened, and greatly to her joy, found him doing well. Anxiety and over exertion soon prostrated her own health, and she was laid upon a sick bed for a month or more.

In November, her health being measurably restored, she returned to Washington, and asked to be assigned to duty by the Christian Commission. She was directed to report to Mrs. Annie Wittenmeyer, who was the Commission's Agent for the establishment of Special Diet Kitchens in the Hospitals. Mrs. Wittenmeyer assigned her a position in charge of the Special Diet Kitchen, on one of the large hospital-boats plying between Louisville and Nashville. While on duty on board this boat in January, 1865, she fell through one of the hatchways, and received injuries which will probably disable her for life, and her condition was for many months so critical as not to permit her removal to her native State. It would seem that here was cause for repining, had she been of a querulous disposition. Herself an invalid for life, among strangers, her only son permanently crippled from wounds received in battle, with none but stranger hands to minister to her necessities, who had done so much to soothe the anguish and mitigate the sorrows of others, there was but little to outward appearance, to compensate her for her four years of ar

duous toil for others, and her present condition of helplessness. Yet we are told, that amid all these depressing circumstances, this heroic woman was full of joy, that she had been permitted to labor so long, and accomplish so much for her country and its defenders, and that peace had at last dawned upon the nation. Even pain could bring no cloud over her brow, no gloom to her heart. To such a heroine, the nation owes higher honors than it has ever bestowed upon the victors of the battle-field.

MRS. E. E. GEORGE.

LD age is generally reckoned as sluggish, infirm, and not easily roused to deeds of active patriotism and earnest endeavor. The aged think and deliberate, but are slow to act. Yet in this glorious work of American Women during the late war, aged women were found ready to volunteer for posts of arduous labor, from which even those in the full vigor of adult womanhood shrank. We shall have occasion to notice this often in the work of the Volunteer Refreshment Saloons, the Soldiers' Homes, etc., where the heavy burdens of toil were borne oftenest by those who had passed the limits of three score years and ten.

Another and a noble example of heroism even to death in a lady advanced in years, is found in the case of Mrs. E. E. George. The Military Agency of Indiana, located at the capital of the State, became, under the influence and promptings of the patriotic and able Governor Morton, a power for good both in the State and in the National armies. Being in constant communication with every part of the field, it was readily and promptly informed of suffering, or want of supplies by the troops of the State at any point, and at once provided for the emergency. The supply of women-nurses for camp, field, or general hospital service, was also made a part of the work of this agency, and the efficient State Agent, Mr. Hannaman, sent into the service two hundred and fifty ladies, who were distributed in the hospitals and at the front, all over the region in insurrection.

« PreviousContinue »