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

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[130] to obtain information for them without fee or reward. She forthwith writes to Miss Barton that she is anxious to gain tidings of her husband, Eli James, Sergeant Company F. Fourth Maine Infantry, who has not been heard of since the battle of

. This letter, when received, is immediately acknowledged, registered in a book, endorsed and filed away for convenient reference. The answer satisfied Mrs. James for the time, that her letter was not lost and that some attention is given to her inquiry. If the fate of Sergeant James is known or can be learned from the official rolls the information is sent at once. Otherwise the case lies over until there are enough to form a roll, which will probably be within a few weeks. A roll of Missing Men is then made up — with an appeal for information respecting them, of which from twenty thousand to thirty thousand copies are printed to be posted all over the United States, in all places where soldiers are most likely to congregate. It is not impossible, that in say two weeks time, one James Miller, of Keokuk, Iowa, writes that he has seen the name of his friend James posted for information; that he found him lying on the ground, at the battle of mortally wounded with a fragment of shell; that he, James, gave the writer a few articles from about his person, and a brief message to his wife and children, whom he is now unable to find; that the national troops fell back from that portion of the field leaving the dead within the enemy's lines, who consequently were never reported. When this letter is received it is also registered in a book, endorsed and filed, and a summary of its contents is sent to Mrs. James, with the intimation that further particulars of interest to her-can be learned by addressing James Miller, of Keokuk, Iowa.

Soon after entering fully upon this work in Washington, and having obtained the rolls of the prison hospitals of Wilmington, Salisbury, Florence, Charleston, and other Rebel prisons of the South, Miss Barton ascertained that Dorrance Atwater, a young Connecticut soldier, who had been a prisoner at Andersonville,