Nurse and Spy in the Union Army

Notwithstanding the “troublous times,” there are generally gay times at the Capital. Levees and public receptions are frequent, except during the reign of terror, when some bold dash of rebel cavalry is made upon the devoted city, and then there is a genuine panic for a short time.

In Washington I think there is as much of the aristocratic spirit as you will find in the United States. People there are respected and graded according to their uniform; everything is regulated according to caste, and it is as David Crocket says about dining: common people dine at twelve, common clerks in departments at one, head clerks at two, representatives at three, heads of departments at four, senators at five, ambassadors at six, and the President – well, he doesn’t dine till the next day.

In one of my rambles I visited the Senate chamber. It was unoccupied, except by a few specimens of young America, who were playing leapfrog over the seats and desks. I leisurely surveyed every item of interest – sat in Sumner’s chair, and recalled the scene enacted there a few years previous, and in imagination thrashed Brooks until he was a fit subject for a hospital – then giving him a farewell coup de pied, I betook me to the picture galleries.

After admiring Pocahontas sufficiently, and gazing at expiring heroes, who all “appeared to be quitting their earthly tabernacles in convulsions,” ruffled shirts, and a tremendous shower of bomb-shell, until my head ached; I then turned for relief to the noble form of “The Father of his Country,” which looked out from the canvas in all the princely majesty which characterized that great and good man. I stood wrapped in profound reverence, when a friend drew my attention to two paintings which I had not noticed before. They represented the surrender of Lord Cornwallis and General Burgoyne. I felt a warm current of blood rush to my face, as I contemplated the humiliating scene – the spirit of Johnny Bull triumphed over my Yankee predilections – and I left the building with feelings of humiliation and disgust.

Next in order, I visited the “Soldier’s Free Library,” in Fifth street, under the superintendence of John A. Fowle, Esq. He has accumulated over two thousand five hundred volumes of well selected historical, biographical and religious works. The soldiers in the different hospitals have the free use of the library, which is open daily. The room is nicely furnished, and the pictures hanging on the walls give it a cheerful, home-look, and the soldiers come there by the score. It is an excellent arrangement. Thanks to the benevolent hearts and hands that have provided such a luxury for the soldier.

An hour’s walk through the contraband camp was amusing and instructive. Here were specimens of all grades of the negro character, from the genuine pious, cheerful trusting christian, to the saucy, lazy, degraded creature, which generations of slavery has made almost on a level with the beasts of the field. But all of them kind-hearted, merry-tempered, and quick to feel and accept the least token of kindness.

Their cheerfulness is proverbial; old women, with wool white with age, bent over the wash-tub, grinned and gossiped in the most cheerful manner – girls romped with their dusky sweethearts, and mothers tossed their babies with that tender pride and mother-love which beautifies the blackest and homeliest face.

All were happy, because they were free – and there seemed to be no room for anything like gloom or despondency in their hearts. Men, women, and children sang, whistled and laughed together – and whether their songs were of heaven, or of hoe-cakes, they were equally inspiring.

I found a young lady there, from the North, who had come to Washington with the intention of nursing the sick soldiers, but her sympathies being divided between sick America and down-trodden Africa, she decided to teach the contrabands instead. She seemed delighted with her employment, and the little black faces were beaming with joy as they gathered around her to receive instruction.

One colored man stood listening to the questions which were being asked and answered, and looked as if he would like to give in his testimony. I turned to him, and asked: “How is it with you? do you think you can take care of yourself, now that you have no master to look after you?” “Gosh a-mighty, guess I can! Ben taking car’ of self and massa too for dis fifteen year. Guess I can take car’ of dis nig all alone now.”

While at one of the hospitals in Alexandria, the head steward told me the following touching incident, which occurred in that hospital. Said he:

“A young man had been placed under our care, who had a severe wound in the thigh. The ball passed completely through, and amputation was necessary. The limb was cut up close to the body, the arteries taken up, and he seemed to be doing well. Subsequently, one of the small arteries sloughed off; an incision was made, and it was taken up. ‘It is well it was not the main artery,’ said the surgeon, as he performed the operation. ‘He might have bled to death before it could have been taken up.’ But the patient, (Charley, as we always spoke of him), got on finely for a time, and was a favorite with us all.

“I was passing through the ward one night, about midnight, when suddenly, as I was passing Charley’s bed, he spoke to me: ‘H – , my leg is bleeding again.’ I threw back the bedclothes, and the blood spirted in the air. The main artery had sloughed off.

“Fortunately, I knew just what to do; and in an instant I had pressed my thumb on the place, and stopped the bleeding. It was so close to the body that there was barely room for my thumb, but I succeeded in keeping it there, and arousing one of the convalescents, sent him for the surgeon, who came in on a run.

“‘I am so thankful,’ said he, as he saw me, ‘that you were up, and knew what to do, for otherwise he must have bled to death before I could have got here.’

“But on examination of the case, he looked exceedingly serious, and sent for other surgeons. All came who were within reach, and a consultation was held over the poor fellow. One conclusion was reached by all. There was no place to work, save the spot where my thumb was placed; they could not work under my thumb, and if I removed it he would bleed to death before the artery could be taken up. There was no way to save his life.

“Poor Charley! He was very calm when they told him, and he requested that his brother, who was in the same hospital, might be called up. He came and sat down by the bedside, and for three hours I stood, and by the pressure of my thumb kept up the life of Charley, while the brothers had their last conversation on earth. It was a strange position for me to occupy, to feel that I held the life of a fellow mortal in my hands, and stranger yet to feel that an act of mine must cause that life to depart. Loving the poor fellow as I did, it was a hard thought; but there was no alternative. The last words were spoken. Charley had arranged all his business affairs, and sent tender messages to absent ones, who little dreamed how near their loved one stood to the grave. The tears filled my eyes more than once as I listened to those parting words. The last good-bye was spoken; then turning to me, he said: ‘Now, H – , I guess you had better remove your thumb.’ ‘Oh, Charley! how can I,’ said I. ‘But it must be done, you know,’ he replied. ‘I thank you very much for your kindness, and now, good-bye.’ He turned away his head. I raised my thumb – once more the life-current gushed forth, and in three minutes he was dead.”

Having heard and seen considerable on my little pleasure trip, and my leave of absence having nearly expired, I prepared to return once more to duty, and on my way to the boat I was fortunate enough to meet with some of the Christian Commission delegates, who were going to Harrison’s Landing on the same boat, and had quite a supply of good things for our sick and wounded. May God bless the Christian Commission – it is doing a noble work, not only for the sick and wounded, but for our soldiers generally.

General Howard, of Maine, that noble christian patriot of whom I have spoken in a previous chapter, was one of the speakers at the great meeting in Philadelphia, January twenty-eighth, the second anniversary of the United States Christian Commission. He delivered a most touching and appropriate address on that occasion, and as it expresses my own sentiments, both with regard to the Christian Commission and the religion of Christ generally, I will quote a portion of his speech, for the benefit of my readers who may not have read it elsewhere:

“I may be allowed to speak freely to the friends who are here to-night. Let me tell you one thing which I need not suppress if I could, and that is, that I feel in my heart a deep and abiding interest in the cause of my Redeemer. I know that this is also the cause of the Christian Commission, and therefore I love it, and identify myself with it; and I doubt not that you love it, and will do everything to sustain it, for a like reason. And now I ask you, as I am to go back to the field to take up my cross anew, and to stand up night and day, evening and morning, for the cause of Him I love, that your earnest, importunate prayers may follow me, and that God would bless the soldiers, that evil may be repressed among them, and that when they go into battle they may go without a fear, because they know in whom they have believed.

“I assert that the highest type of courage is christian courage. When your spirit yearns up to God in prayer, ‘Oh, Lord, be my protector, and in this peril let me run under the shadow of thy wing,’ then you will fear no evil, though you walk through the valley and the shadow of death. My friends, these things are realities with me. By the blessing of God, by his spirit, he has enabled me to have a clear conviction that should he take me away I shall go to be with him. Not because I am good, or holy, or righteous; but because I have a Saviour; an all-sufficient Saviour, who is able to save even the chief of sinners unto the utmost. Therefore, I am able to say that I can go into the battle fearing no evil. And would to God, for their sakes, that every officer in the army and every soldier in the ranks could declare, in sincerity from the depths of his heart, that God had done such great things for him! These, to me, are settled, solemn convictions; and I speak them freely and frankly, as I am encouraged to do on this auspicious occasion.

“It may seem to some that it is expressing one’s feelings too publicly; but I think it well for me to bear such testimony in a work like yours, which contemplates this great and all-important result, the promotion of heart religion and the salvation of souls. And especially do I feel this in these times of excitement and terror – over the mere temporal accessories of war, the dreadful sacrifice of lives, the horrible sights of wounds, the caring for the sick and wounded, the lamentations for the dead – amid all this I fear that the still, small voice has not always been listened to; the silent and beautiful, though wonderful work of the Spirit of God has not been seen, and its importance felt as it should be in our land. This the Christian Commission is striving to accomplish; it seeks to keep alive the spirit of Christianity among our soldiers. Their agency is the leaven in our armies. May they leaven the whole lump!

“It is this only that will prepare us for our liberty. This bond, the bond of christian love, is the true bond after all that shall permanently unite us. There is no other. We speak of the claims of commerce and trade, of corn and cotton, that will unite the sections of our country; but these are temporary, fluctuating, perishing links. The religion of Jesus Christ is the lasting bond that connects not only Maine with Massachusetts and Massachusetts with Connecticut, but Maine with Texas and Florida with Wisconsin.

“We boast of being an asylum for all nations. From England, Ireland, France, Germany, Russia, and almost every country beyond the ocean, come men, women and children, who settle down in our midst. How shall we cause them to assimilate to us? How shall we ever make them good and useful citizens? Will it be, think you, by merely giving them land on which to settle? Will they become one with us because they grow in material wealth and prosperity? No, no! Nothing but an education, a true education of heart and morals, such as the religion of Jesus Christ imparts, can ever truly and safely assimilate all these heterogeneous elements, and enable us to be truly one people.

“The gospel has its victories to achieve for us as well as the sword. Many of the rebels hated us worse before the war than they do now. They respect us much more than they once did, after seeing that we are not afraid to expose our bodies to be burned, if necessary, in a just cause – the cause of our country that we love; that we shrink from no sacrifice of money, time or life in order to maintain and perpetuate the beautiful Government that our fathers bequeathed to us. But this is not all. They have felt, too, the power of the spirit of kindness and love, of which the religion of Jesus has borne so many fruits in this struggle.

“They have been astonished at the kindness which has been shown to them when they have fallen into our hands. It was this that demoralized them at Vicksburg. In the West the rebels are not so violent as they were. When they come into our lines now they say they were forced to fight, that they are Union men, and always were Union men. And they are coming in every day. We have just heard that when General Rosecrans took command of the Cumberland army, eight thousand delivered themselves up to us. And do they hate us? No! We have melted them down by christian kindness and love. And, my friends, this is the way to disarm them. I believe, and say it with emphatic assurance, that if we all have the spirit of the Master in our hearts we shall demoralize them wherever we find them!

“I do not advocate any shrinking back or checking of the terrible steeds of war. No! Fill up the ranks. Make the next campaign more vigorous than any that has gone before it, so that it shall be, by the Divine help, perfectly impossible for the rebels to keep the field. But let us wield this power along with the alleviating and saving influences of the religion of Christ. Let these, as diffused by the Christian Commission and in other ways, follow our armies everywhere, blessing friend and foe alike, and we shall then cause the enemy to come within our lines, not only by the eight thousand, but by the sixteen and sixty thousand. It is this that will ruin their cause, and finally break down their opposition.”

CHAPTER XIX

While we remained at Harrison’s Landing I spent much of my time in the hospitals. Nellie was now my faithful friend and companion, my colleague when on duty, and my escort on all occasions in my rides and rambles. She was a splendid woman, and had the best faculty of dispelling the blues, dumps and dismals of any person I ever met. When we went to a hospital and found the nurses looking tired and anxious and the patients gloomy and sad, it never required more than half an hour for us to get up a different state of feeling, and dispel that “Hark-from-the-tombs-a-doleful-sound” sort of spirit, and we invariably left the men in a more cheerful mood, evidently benefited by having a little respite from that depressing melancholy so prevalent among the sick, and so often indulged by nurses.

In our own hospital we generally managed to so assort and arrange the patients as to have all of the same temperament and disease together, so that we knew just what to do and what to say to suit each department. We had our patients divided into three classes; one was our working department, another our pleasure department, and a third our pathetic department. One we visited with bandages, plasters and pins; another, with books and flowers; and the third, with beef tea, currant wine, and general consolation. Sometimes Nellie would sit and fan the patients for hours in the latter department, and sing some soothing pieces in her soft, sweet strains, until she would have them all asleep, or quiet as babies. I think the soldiers may truly say of the gentle Nellie:

Her soothing tones with peace beguile
The weary hours of pain,
And make the lonely sufferer smile
And joy to come again.

Still let me often hear thy voice,
Which gently whispers peace,
And let my troubled heart rejoice,
And strains of sadness cease;

Still speak to me of pleasant things —
Of faith, and hope, and joy;
Then shall I rise on lightsome wings
Where pains no more annoy.

I used to watch with much interest the countenances of those men as they lay fast asleep, and I often thought that I could read their characters better when asleep than when awake. Some faces would grow stern and grim – they were evidently dreaming of war, and living over again those terrible battles in which they had so recently participated; some groaned over their wounds, and cursed the rebels vigorously; others grew sad, and would talk in the most pathetic tones, as if the pain borne so silently through the day revenged itself now by betraying what the man’s pride concealed so well while awake. Often the roughest grew young and pleasant when sleep smoothed away the hard lines from the brow, letting the real nature assert itself. Many times I would be quite disappointed, for the faces which looked merry and pleasing when awake would suddenly grow dark and hideous, as if communing with some dark spirits of another world.

One poor fellow, whose brain was injured more than his body, would wear himself out more in an hour when asleep than in a whole day when awake. His imagination would conjure up the wildest fancies; one moment he was cheering on his men, the next he was hurrying them back again; then counting the dead around him, while an incessant stream of shouts, whispered warnings and broken lamentations would escape from his lips.

I became acquainted with a young man from Rhode Island in one of the hospitals, who was the most patient and cheerful person it has been my lot to meet under such circumstances. I find the following notice with regard to him:

“I came out here,” said he, “as rough and as bad as any of them. But I had left a praying mother at home. While in camp at Poolesville I heard that she was dead. After that her image was never out of my thoughts. It seemed as if her form appeared to me as in a mirror, and always as wrestling for her wayward son. Go where I might I felt as if I saw her in her place of prayer, kneeling and putting up her petitions to God, and not even the roar of battle could drown the soft tones of her voice.”

He was at the battle of Fair Oaks, and when it ceased sat down on a log, exhausted, by the wayside, and then, to use his own words, he “thought over the matter.” Heaps of dead men lay on every side of him. They had fallen, but he was still unharmed. The melting words of his mother’s prayer came back to his mind with new power. He thought of his own condition, and of her happy home, so far removed from the strife and agony of war. A pious soldier of his company noticed that he was very thoughtful, and inquired the reason. To this friend he opened his mind freely, and told him how he felt. They sought occasion for private conference, communed together and prayed; strength was given him to make the “last resolve,” and the soldier who had been so rough and had became a soldier in the Army of Jesus. The sainted mother had not prayed in vain. A battle had just been fought, a victory won, which was spreading joy throughout the nation; but here, too, was a triumph, a different triumph, such as cause the angels of God in heaven to rejoice.

Just as I am, without one plea,
But that Thy blood was shed for me,
And that Thou bid’st me come to Thee,
O Lamb of God! I come.

One day, while employed in the hospital assisting Nellie in some new arrangement for the amusement of the men, I received a letter from the captain to whom I had given my horse for the use of himself and three companions on the retreat from before Richmond. He and his friends had reached the James river in safety, and had been so fortunate as to get on board of one of the transports which had been sent for the wounded, and were now comfortably installed in a hospital in Washington. He also wrote that he had given my horse in charge of one of the quartermasters of General G.’s brigade, a piece of information which I was exceedingly glad to hear, for my colt was well nigh spoiled on the retreat, and if it had not been, was not fit to ride much, or indeed at all, to do it justice, for it proved to be not quite two years old.

But upon finding the quartermaster I was politely informed that he had bought and paid for the horse, and of course I could not have it. I said nothing, but went to General M.’s headquarters, stated the case, and procured an order which brought the horse in double-quick time, and no thanks to the quartermaster.

A month passed away, and everything remained quiet at Harrison’s Landing and vicinity. The troops, having rested, began to grow tired of the routine of camp life, and were anxious for another brush with the enemy. The vigilant eye of McClellan noted the impatience of the men, and he daily kept urging the necessity of reinforcements, and protested against leaving the Peninsula, as retreat, in his opinion, would prove disastrous both to the army and the cause. Our commander’s patience was well nigh exhausted, as the following brief despatch of July 30th indicates:

“I hope that it may soon be decided what is to be done by this army, and that the decision may be to reinforce it at once. We are losing much valuable time, and that at a moment when energy and decision are sadly needed.”

About this time an order came from Washington for all the sick to be sent away, without giving any definite information with regard to the intended movements of the army.