L. P. Brockett, Women's work in the civil war: a record of heroism, patriotism and patience

“ [57] and bye, at Williamsburg, or Fair Oaks, or in that terrible retreat to James River, or at Cedar Mountain, it matters not which, the swift speeding bullet laid him low, and after days, or it may be weeks of terrible suffering, he gave up his young life on the altar of his country. The shock was a terrible one to those lone dwellers on the snowy hills. He was their all, but it was for the cause of Freedom, of Right, of God; and hushing the wild beating of their hearts they bestir themselves, in their deep poverty, to do something for the cause for which their young hero had given his life. It is but little, for they are sorely straitened; but the mother, though her heart is wrapped in the darkness of sorrow, saves the expense of mourning apparel, and the daughter turns her faded dress; the little earnings of both are carefully hoarded, the pretty chintz curtains which had made their humble room cheerful, are replaced by paper, and by dint of constant saving, enough money is raised to purchase the other materials for a hospital quilt, a pair of socks, and a shirt, to be sent to the Relief Association, to give comfort to some poor wounded soldier, tossing in agony in some distant hospital. And this, with but slight variation is the history of hundreds, and perhaps thousands of the articles sent to the soldiers' aid societies.”

This fire of patriotic zeal, while it glowed alike in the hearts of the rich and poor, inflamed the young as well as the old. Little girls, who had not attained their tenth year, or who had just passed it, denied themselves the luxuries and toys they had long desired, and toiled with a patience and perseverance wholly foreign to childish nature, to procure or make something of value for their country's defenders. On a pair of socks sent to the Central Association of Relief, was pinned a paper with this legend: “These stockings were knit by a little girl five years old, and she is going to knit some more, for mother said it will help some poor soldier.” The official reports of the Women's Soldiers' Aid Society of Northern Ohio, the Cleveland branch of the Sanitary Commission, furnish the following incident: “Every Saturday morning ”