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Mrs. Nellie Maria Taylor.
- Parentage and early history -- removal to New Orleans -- her son urged to enlist in the rebel army -- he is sent North -- the rebels persecute Mrs. Taylor -- her dismissal from her position as principal of one of the city schools -- her house mobbed -- “I am for the Union, tear my house down if you choose!” -- her house searched seven times for the flag -- the Judge's son -- “a piece of Southern chivalry” -- her son enlists in the rebel army to save her from molestation -- New Orleans occupied by the Union forces -- Mrs. Taylor reinstated as teacher -- she nurses the soldiers in the hospitals, during her vacations and in all the leisure hours from her school duties, her daughter filling up the intermediate time with her services -- she expends her entire salary upon the sick and wounded -- writes eleven hundred and seventy-four letters for them in one year -- Distributes the supplies received from the Cincinnati Branch of Sanitary Commission in 1864, and during the summer takes the management of the special diet of the University Hospital -- testimony of the soldiers to her labors -- patriotism and zeal of her children -- terms on which Miss Alice Taylor would present a confederate flag to a company
The Southwest bore rank weeds of secession and treason, spreading poison and devastation over that portion of our fair national heritage. But from the same soil, amidst the ruin and desolation which followed the breaking out of the rebellion, there sprang up growths of loyalty and patriotism, which by flowering and fruitage, redeemed the land from the curse that had fallen upon it. Among the women of the Southwest have occurred instances of the most devoted loyalty, the most self-sacrificing patriotism. They have suffered deeply and worked nobly, and their efforts alone have been sufficient to show that no part of our fair land was irrecoverably doomed to fall beneath the ban of a government opposed to freedom, truth, and progress. Prominent among these noble women, is Mrs. Nellie Maria Taylor, of New Orleans, whose sufferings claim our warmest sympathy, and whose work our highest admiration and gratitude. Mrs. Taylor, whose maiden name was Dewey, was born in Watertown, Jefferson county, New York, in the year 1821, of New England parentage. At an early age she removed with her parents to the West, where, as she says of herself, she “grew up among the Indians,” and perhaps, by her free life, gained something of the firmness of health and strength of character and purpose, which have brought her triumphantly through the trials and labors of the past four years. She married early, and about the year 1847 removed with her
