[for the Dispatch.]
Middleburg, June 28, 1861.
I observe among your items that you make mention of the patriotism and energy of the ladies of Southern States in coming forward to relieve the necessities and ameliorate the condition of our brave defenders, and express a hope that the Virginia ladies will follow their example.
While awarding them all the credit they so richly deserve, I do not think Virginia has been or will be, behind her sister States in patriotic efforts.
Her daughters as well as sons have responded promptly, courageously and earnestly to the call made upon them, and their amor patria is burning as brightly on the altars of their hearts as the flame ever burned in the bosoms of their mothers in the times of the Revolution; and if there were not so many brave and gallant sons to defend the Old Dominion her daughters would form a regiment to aid in driving back our dastardly Northern foe. As it should be, woman is not taken from her sphere, and the gentle offices of tenderness and mercy are left for her to perform; and when ‘"weighed in the balance, she will not be found wanting"’
Woman's nature and woman's willingness has been fully tested and proven, in the little inland town of Middleburg.
A call being made to organize a company of nurses, the ladies responded to it with alacrity, and eleven offered to leave their families when called upon to devote themselves to the alleviation of the sufferings of their brave defenders.
Since I have been here wagon load after wagon load of provisions and necessaries have been sent to the sick at different stations, gotten up with energy and dispatch by the ladies of the place, and a committee has been formed to send weekly to the hospital to be established at Fairfax Court- House, provisions and any other requirement for the sick or wounded.
This is not spoken of in a spirit of boastfulness, but in justice to those who have so nobly sacrificed their comforts to the wants off others, and that it may stimulate others to do as they have done. Justice.