August, ‘61. Dear Girls: I have wrenched this opportunity from Abby to take my turn in writing you. It is as good as a fight to attempt to do anything useful in this family. Each one considers it her peculiar province, and if I manage to tuck in a handkerchief or two in the next [...]
August, ‘61. Dear Girls: Did you give the company captains my little books by Ordronneaux? If not, please do so. They have much useful advice, and as each captain ought to be the father of his company, and look after its welfare in every respect, some such little manual might be useful to them. In [...]
Ebbitt House, Washington, August 10, 1861. Dear Joe: We had a very successful journey in from camp yesterday, for who should be on the boat but the Prince (called by the public “Captain Paris,”) McDowell, and McClellan himself, whom Mrs. Franklin introduced to us, and who helped us all into the carriage when we reached [...]
Brevoort Place, August 8th, 1861. Your response to my patriotic fervors gave me a sort of chill. We did not seem en rapport. . . . We are heartily ready to record our faith that the war is worth what it may cost, although the end may be only–only! the preservation of the Government, and [...]
25 Cooper Union, N. Y., August 7th, 1861. My dear Miss Woolsey: Dr. Blackwell, at our last board meeting, read a very interesting letter from you, giving details about the hospitals. We should be very much obliged if you would be willing to write us a few incidents in regard to hospital supplies. Any [...]
Washington, August –. Hurrah for you, to be offered the Colonelcy of the regiment! I am glad, however, that you have no wish to take it. I shrink from any such responsibility for you. Dr. Bacon came in last evening and we had a nice pleasant chat. His regiment, the 2nd Connecticut, goes home to-day [...]
10th Street, July 31. My dear Eliza: We were quite touched by a note and a message from your farmer Thomson, and I write at once that no time may be lost in carrying out the generous wishes of the people on the place. As soon as they received the particulars of the battle of [...]
Receiving the nurses, and seeing that they were safely started on their way to various hospitals, and reporting to the New York committees on their services therein were among our occupations in the first year of the war. New York, July 30th. My dear Miss Woolsey: I was extremely glad to receive your excellent letter [...]
Social formalities were entirely abandoned in Washington in war time. The Ebbitt House public parlors were on a level with F street and the windows were always open. Any friends in passing would catch a glimpse of us and happen in for comradeship, giving bits of news, and offering kindly services. One group of four [...]
Having established our own position and made it clear that we had no intention of being bluffed off, we were accepted by the surgeons and Miss Dix at our own valuation (purposely made high!) and from that moment our path was as a shining light. All hospitals were open to us, and our relations with [...]
Mother to Eliza. Brevoort Place, Late in July. My dear Eliza: If the regiments are all to be stationary for some time you and G. might run on for a visit. I have given up my plan of going to you for the present unless you should need me. We are now talking again of [...]
The regiments called out for three months were now about disbanding, though a large number of the men at once re-enlisted for the war. – – – – – – – July 27, 10 a. m. My dear Eliza: I have just been up to the corner to see [...]
Dear Girls: Your full, interesting letters have come in and given great relief. G’s of today is certainly altogether more cheerful in tone than Eliza’s of Tuesday, and very naturally. We are beginning to “look up “ a little, too. Your rebuff by Miss Dix has been the subject of great indignation, but we all [...]
Tuesday Morning, July 23, ‘61. God be praised for that telegram! What a day was yesterday to us; and what a day must it have been to you, my dear Eliza! The terrible news, the conflicting reports, the almost unendurable suspense we were in, the distance from you at such a time! Altogether it was [...]
Georgeanna Muirson Woolsey writes: Washington, July 22, 1861. My dear Cousin Margaret: This is the third attempt I have made to finish a letter to you. Joe is safe and quietly sleeping on the sofa by us. You know all about this total defeat–our army is entirely broken up, all the army stores, three of [...]
New York, July 23. Abby is in the front parlor reading the papers. It is quite useless to say anything about going into the country just now. If we are away from the daily papers, or if they are delayed an hour the girls get into a perfect fever; besides, Abby, you know, has decided [...]
Astoria, July 23. We are trying to look things in the face,–like the great apostle, cast down but not disheartened. Of course the first thought of us civilians is to take care of the wounded. I send enclosed a cheque from Cousin Edward and one from myself. If you find you cannot use these amounts [...]
July 22, 1861. My dear Girls: Since Mother’s letter was sent this morning we have had some heavy hours. At noon we got the first extra with the despatch announcing the defeat and retreat of our troops–defeat, because retreat, or vice versa, whichever it was. It is a total rout of our grand army of [...]
Monday, July 22, 1861. My dear Girls We have had an exciting night and morning. Just as we were going to bed last night we heard the distant sound of an “Extra;” it was very late; everybody in bed. We had been out to the meeting of the Evangelical Alliance at Dr. McAuley’s Church. We [...]
Joseph Howland On The Battle-Field Near Bull Run, Sunday, 21, 12.45 p. m. Our brigade is making a demonstration in the face of the enemy and a fight is going on on the right of the line five or six miles off. The enemy’s batteries do not return our fire. We see immense masses of [...]
Joseph Howland writes from Camp near Centreville. July 20th. We march at 6 p. m., and there will be a great battle within twenty-four hours unless the rebels retreat. Our brigade takes the advance on the left wing. We can see the enemy from a high hill near here concentrating their troops. Our pickets were [...]
Our regiment had only been camped a few days on Cameron Run when the advance against the enemy at Manassas was ordered, and we two (Georgeanna and Eliza) watched the brigade break camp and march down the peaceful country road, carrying Joe away from us. We stood alone, and looked after them as long as [...]
Our regiment, the Sixteenth New York, was about two weeks stationed at “ Camp Woolsey,” near the Capitol, and then crossed the Potomac and pitched its tents on Cameron Run, a little west of Alexandria, in the fields which were once the property of our great-great-Aunt Ricketts, whose plantation was famous for its flour, ground [...]
“No one knows, who did not watch the thing from the beginning, how much opposition, how much how much unfeeling want of thought, these women nurses endured. Hardly a surgeon whom I can think of, received or treated them with even common courtesy. Government had decided that women should be employed, and the army surgeons—unable, [...]
New York, Monday, July 15, 1861. My dear Girls: I might as well give you the benefit of a scrawl just to thank you for the big yellow envelope in Georgy’s handwriting lying on the library table by me. It has just come and I think you are two of the luckiest fellows living to [...]