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

“ [195] bring strength, and hope, and comfort to these poor suffering men?” and the answer was, “Yes, by God's help we will!” The first thing was to give them something like a comfortable bed, and, Sunday though it was, we went to work to run up our sheets into bed-sacks. Every man that had strength enough to stagger was pressed into the service, and by night most of them had something softer than a tarpaulin to sleep on. “Oh, I am so comfortable now!” some of them said; “I think I can sleep to-night,” exclaimed one little fellow, half-laughing with pleasure. The next thing was to provide something that sick people could eat, for coffee and bread was poor food for most of them. We had two little stoves, one in the cabin and one in the chambermaid's room, and here, the whole time we were on board, we had to do the cooking for a hundred men. Twenty times that day I fully made up my mind to cry with vexation, and twenty times that day I laughed instead; and surely, a kettle of tea was never made under so many difficulties as the one I made that morning. The kettle lid was not to be found, the water simmered and sang at its leisure, and when I asked for the poker I could get nothing but an old bayonet, and, all the time, through the half-open door behind me, I heard the poor hungry fellows asking the nurses, “Where is that tea the lady promised me?” or “When will my toast come?” But there must be an end to all things, and when I carried them their tea and toast, and heard them pronounce it “plaguey good,” and “awful nice,” it was more than a recompense for all the worry.

One great trouble was the intense cold. We could not keep life in some of the poor emaciated frames. “Oh dear! I shall freeze to death!” one poor little fellow groaned, as I passed him. Blankets seemed to have no effect upon them, and at last we had to keep canteens filled with boiling water at their feet. ...

There was one poor boy about whom from the first I had been very anxious. He drooped and faded from day to day before my eyes. Nothing but constant stimulants seemed to keep