MEET MISS DIX AND GO TO FREDERICKSBURG.
I sat down stairs, for the first time after a two weeks' illness, when
Georgie Willets, of Jersey City, came in, saying:
"Here is a pass for you and one for me, to go to Fredericksburg! A boat
leaves in two hours, and we must hurry!"
For several days the air had shuddered with accounts of the terrible
suffering of our men, wounded in the battle of the Wilderness; and a
pall of uncertainty and gloom hung over the city.
I made a tuck in a queen's-cloth dress, donned it, selected a light
satchel, put into one side a bottle of whiskey and one of sherry, half a
pound of green tea, two rolls of bandage and as much old table-linen as
packed them close; put some clothing for myself in the other side, and a
cake of black castile soap, for cleansing wounds; took a pair of good
scissors, with one sharp point, and a small rubber syringe, as surgical
instruments; put these in my pocket, with strings attaching them to my
belt; got on my Shaker bonnet, and with a large blanket shawl and tin
cup, was on board with Georgie, an hour before the boat left.
It had brought a load of wounded from Belle Plain; some were still on
board, and suffering intensely from thirst, and hard, dry dressings. It
was a hot day, and we both went to work giving drinks of water, wetting
wounds, and bathing hot heads and hands. As Georgie passed the foot of
the cabin stairs, Miss Dix was coming down, and called to her, saying:
"What are you doing here?"
She made no reply, but passed on to her work, when the irate lady turned
to where I was drawing water from a cooler, and asked, in a tone of high
displeasure:
"Who is that young girl?"
"Miss Georgie Willets, of Jersey City," I replied.
"And where is she going?"
"To Fredericksburg."
"By whose authority?" she demanded.
"By authority of the Surgeon-General," I replied.
"The Surgeon-General has no authority to send a young girl down there
alone."
"She is not going alone."
"Who is going with her?" she asked, tartly.
"I am."
"Who are you?"
I told her, and she ceased to be insulting long enough to expostulate on
the great impropriety of the proceeding, as well as to explain the total
lack of any need of help in Fredericksburg. She had just returned from
that city, where she had arranged everything in the most satisfactory
manner. Hospitals had been established, with surgeons and nurses. There
was therefore not the slightest occasion for our going further; but she
was about to organize relief for the men while waiting at the Washington
wharf to be taken to hospitals. Here I might be useful, and here she
would be glad to have me work; but as for that handsome young girl, she
wondered at me for bringing her into such a place.
Georgie was not merely handsome. She was grand, queenly; and I told Miss
Dix that I differed with her about the kind of women who should go into
such places. We wanted young, vigorous women--women whose self-respect
and social position would command the respect of those to whom they
ministered. She grew angry again, and said:
"She shall not go to Fredericksburg; I will have her arrested!"
I was kneeling beside a man whose wounds I was bathing; for I had not
suspended my work to talk with her, who stood, straight as a telegraph
pole, holding a bottle which she ever and anon applied to her nose; but
when she reached this climax, I raised my head, looked into her face,
and said:
"I shall not be sorry Miss Dix, if you do; for then I shall apply to my
friends, Mrs. Abraham Lincoln and Secretary Stanton, and have your
authority tested."
I went on with my work; she growled something and left the boat, but did
not disturb us further.
Going down the river I grew worse, and thought I might be obliged to
return with the boat, and stay at home; but consulted a surgeon on his
way to the front, who talked with another, and said:
"There is no immediate danger in your case. It is only secondary
hemorrhage; and with care you may go on, but must not attempt to do
anything. You can, however, be of incalculable service, simply by being
in Fredericksburg; can sit down and see that people do their duty. What
our wounded need most, is people who have an interest in their
welfare--friends. You can do a great deal toward supplying this want,
this great need; but be careful and do not try to work."
After some time this surgeon brought, and introduced Col. Chamberlain,
of Maine, evidently an invalid, and a man of the purely intellectual
type. Two other surgeons were with him, and all three endeavored to
persuade him to return to Washington, as his lack of health made it very
dangerous, if not quite useless, for him to go to the front. I thought
the surgeons right; and told him I feared he was throwing away his life,
in an effort to do the impossible.
He explained that he was in command of a brigade of eight regiments;
that in them were hundreds of his neighbors and pupils, for he had
resigned a professorship in a college to enlist. Said he knew his own
constitution better than any one else could know it; knew he would be
stronger when he reached his post, and that the danger would be in any
attempt to keep out of danger--the danger which his men must face.
Turning to me he said:
"If you had eight children down there, you would go to them, if you
could!"
We arranged that if he should be wounded so as to suffer a thigh
amputation, he should let me know, that I might nurse him through.
At Belle Plaine, Georgie went to look for transportation, and I to the
Sanitary Commission boat, where I was introduced to Mrs. Gen. Barlow and
Miss Hancock, both busy furnishing hot coffee to those being embarked
for Washington. Mrs. Barlow was a tall, superbly formed woman, very
handsome, and full of health and spirits. She looked down on me
compassionately, and said:
"Oh, you poor little thing! What ever brought you here? We have sick
folks enough now! Do sit down until I get you a cup of tea!"
While I drank the tea, she stood looking at me, and said meditatively:
"Oh, you queer little thing," and hurried off to her work.
Soon a Colonel with a badly wounded head came on board, leaned against,
a post and groaned. I found a basin of water and a towel, and began
bathing his head, wetting those torturing dressings and making him
comparatively comfortable, when she stopped in her hurried walk, looked
on an instant, and exclaimed:
"Oh, you nice little thing! Now I see what you are good for! I could not
do that; but you will take care of their wounds and I will feed them!
That will be grand!"
Soon Georgie came to say there was no transportation to be had, but she
had found a Campbell surgeon in charge of a hospital tent, and he wanted
me; said he was worn out, and had plenty of work for both of us. The
doctor had a large tent, filled with wounded lying on loose hay. His
patients seemed to want for nothing, but he must needs give so much time
to receiving and forwarding those pouring in from the front, that he
needed us. He had a little tent put up for us, and that was the only
night I have ever slept in a tent.
Next morning while we were attending to a Colonel, and Lieutenant
Colonel, both of the same regiment, and both badly wounded and just
brought in, one said to the other: "My God, if our men in Fredericksburg
could have a little of this care!" "Why?" said I, "I have heard that
everything possible was being done for them?"
"Everything possible!" exclaimed one, and both together began the most
terrible recital of the neglect and abuse of the wounded in that
horrible place--men dying of thirst, and women spitting in their faces,
kicking and spurning them. We set down our basins; Georgie started in
one direction and I in another, to find transportation.
The surgeon in command of the station stood superintending the loading
of oats while he looked at my pass, and said he could not possibly send
us, adding: "Fredericksburg is no place for a lady. It is impossible to
describe the condition of things there."
"But, Doctor, I am not a lady! I am a hospital nurse. The place where
men are suffering must be the place for me. I do not look strong, but
you cannot think how much I can do.
"But, Madam, you forget that our army is cut off from its base of
supplies, and must be furnished with subsistence, and that we have not
half the transportations we need."
"Doctor, you are sending bags of oats in ambulances! I do not weigh much
more than one, and will be worth six when you get me there."
He promised to send me that afternoon, but I doubted him; went to the
Christian Commission tent, found a man who knew me by reputation, and
told him they had better send me to Fredericksburg, or put me under
arrest, for I was in a mood to be dangerous. He feigned fright, caught
up his hat, and said:
"We'll get you out of this in the shortest possible space of time."
An hour after I was on the way, and Georgie a few moments in advance. I
had seen bad roads in northern and western Pennsylvania, but this was my
first ride over no road. We met a steady stream of such wounded as were
able to walk, but comparatively few were brought in ambulances.
It was raining when we reached Fredericksburg, at four o'clock on
Sabbath, and I went to the surgeon in command, reported, and asked him
to send me to the worst place--the place where there was most need.
"Then I had better send you to the Old Theater, for I can get no one to
stay there."
He gave me my appointment, and I went to a Corps Surgeon, who signed it,
and advised me not to go to the theater--I could do nothing, as the
place was in such dreadful condition, while I could be useful in many
other places.