EXPLANATORY NOTE TO THE CHEAP EDITION.

TH

HIS cheap edition of "My Story of the War" is printed from the same electrotype plates used for the illustrated, higher-priced edition. It is illustrated only with a steel-plate portrait of the author. Owing to the great expense of producing the fine steel plates and colored battle flag plates inserted in the illustrated edition, they cannot possibly be included in this low-priced edition. Inasmuch therefore as these illustrations are omitted in this edition, the reading matter describing them is also omitted. With these exceptions the text of both editions is exactly the same, and Mrs. Livermore's narrative as contained in this volume is given in full and is printed from the original plates.

In the illustrated edition the illustrations are paged in with the text, and their omission in this cheap edition, and the omission of the reading matter describing them, will account for an occasional skipping of pages, which, however, in no way affects the narrative.

THE PUBLISHERS.

PREFACE

T the close of the war, I was importuned to publish my experiences and reminiscences in connection with the hospitals and the relief work of the Sanitary Commission. But I declined to do so. A horror of the war still enwrapped the country. The salvation of the nation had been purchased with the blood of her sons, and she was still in the throes of anguish because of her bereavement. The people had turned with relief to the employments of peaceful life, eager to forget the fearful years of battle and carnage. I put away all mementoes of the exceptional life I had led, and re-entered with gladness upon the duties connected with my home and family, giving my leisure, as before the war, to charitable work and literary pursuits. I expected this quiet and happy order of things would continue to the end.

It has been otherwise ordered. The twenty-odd years that have passed since the bells rang in the long prayer for peace have been unlike any of which I had ever dreamed. They have been packed with work, have brought me in contact with people and events of national importance, have afforded me extended opportunities of travel in my own country and Europe, and have given me a largeness and

variety of experience not often gained by a woman.

The sun of my life is now sloping swiftly to the west, the years that I have travelled lie stretching in long array behind me, and I am approaching the time when one lives much in memory. I have again been asked to write for publication my story of the war and its relief work, and this time the request has found me favorably disposed to the undertaking.

The public ear has listened eagerly to the stories of the great battles of the war of the rebellion, told by the master spirits who conducted them, and who led the hosts of freedom to victory. The plan of the campaigns, the division of the forces, and the parts assigned to the various officers in command, the topography of the battle-fields, the personal prowess and heroism developed in the hotly contested struggle, and the jubilant victory which resulted, whose pæans of joy drowned the cries of the wounded and the wails of bereavement of these histories the people have not grown weary. Every detail of Fort Donelson and Vicksburg, Antietam and Gettysburg, and the surrender of Appomattox is eagerly sought and devoured with zest. Millions of readers bend over the thrilling autobiographies of Grant, Sherman, Logan, and other great captains of the memorable war, when, on the top wave of a nation's righteous wrath with slavery, four million of slaves were lifted to the level of freemen.

But there is a paucity of histories of the private soldier, of sketches of the rank and file. These have not been written, partly because of the modesty of the men whose experiences were worth narrating, and partly because they were not favorably circumstanced for extensive observation. There is a whole world of thrilling and heroic deed and endeavor, of lofty patience, silent endurance and sacrifice, connected with the soldiers of the army, of which the world