CHAPTER XIV
HARPER’S FERRY TO ANTIETAM
Clara Barton had now definitely settled the method of her operations. She had demonstrated the practicability of getting to the front early, and had begun to learn what equipment was necessary if she were to perform her work successfully. Washington was still to be her headquarters, her base of supplies, but from Washington as a center she would radiate in any direction where the need was, going by the most direct route and arriving on the scene of conflict as soon as possible after authentic news of the battle. This was in contravention of all established custom, which was for women, if they assisted at all, to remain far in the rear until wounded soldiers were conveyed to them, or until the retreat of the opposing army made it safe for them to come upon the field where the conflict had been. It disheartened her to have to remain in Washington where there was no lack of willing assistance, and wait till it was safe to stir.
Moreover, she did not find her service in the Washington hospitals wholly cheerful. It depressed her to move among the wounded and witness the after effects of the battle, the gangrene, the infection of wounds, and the slow fevers, and to think how much of this might have been avoided if the men could have had relief earlier. An extract from a letter to her sister-in-law, written in the summer of 1862, indicates something of her feeling at this time:
Washington, D.C., June 26th, 1862
My dear Sister Julia:
I cannot make a pleasant letter of this; everything is sad; the very pain which is breathed out in the atmosphere of this city is enough to sadden any human heart. Five thousand suffering men, and room preparing for eight thousand more,—poor, fevered, cut-up wretches, it agonizes me to think of it. I go when I can; to-day am having a visit from a little Massachusetts (Lowell) boy, seventeen, his widowed mother’s only child, whom I found recovering from fever in Mount Pleasant Hospital. It had left him with rheumatism. He was tender, and, when I asked him “what he wanted,” burst in tears and said, “I want to see my mother. She didn’t know when I left.” I appealed to the chief surgeon and applied for his discharge as a native of Massachusetts. It was promised me, and, when the astonished little fellow heard it, he threw himself across the back of his chair and sobbed so he could scarcely get his breath. He had been ordered to another hospital next day; the order was checked; this was a week ago, and yesterday he came to me discharged, and with forty-three dollars and some new clothes. I send him on to-night to his mother as a Sunday present. She knows nothing of it, only that he is suffering in hospital. I am ungrateful to be heavy-hearted when I have been able to do only that little. His name is William Diggles, nephew of Jonas Diggles, tailor of New Sharon, Maine.
Authentic news of battles reached Washington slowly. At first there was no certainty whether a battle was a battle or only a skirmish. Then, when it became certain that a battle had been fought, the first news was almost always unreliable. It would have been a great advantage if Clara Barton could have known where a battle was to be fought. Manifestly, she could not always know. The generals in command did not always know. But there were times when official Washington had premonitory information. She sought to establish relationship with sufficiently high authority to enable her to know in advance where such battles were to be fought as were brought on by a Union offensive. On Saturday night, September 13, 1862, she had secret information that a great battle was about to be fought. A small battle had been fought the day before and it had been disastrous. There had been an engagement at Harper’s Ferry in which the Union army had 44 killed, 173 wounded, and the amazing number of 12,520 missing or captured. She already suspected, and a little later she knew, that that long list of men missing and captured, was more ominous than an added number killed or wounded:
“Our army was weary,” she said, “and lacked not only physical strength, but confidence and spirit. And why should they not? Always defeated! Always on the retreat! I was almost demoralized myself! And I had just commenced.”
She “had just commenced”; that was characteristic of her. She had been ministering to the soldiers ever since the day when the first blood was shed on the 19th of April, 1861, and had been at it without rest or stint ever since. But she had just commenced; she had just learned how to do it in the way that was hereafter to characterize her methods.
The defeat at Harper’s Ferry threw Washington into a panic. But it moved McClellan to a long-deferred engagement with the Union forces in the offensive.
The long maneuvering and skirmishing [she wrote], had yielded no fruit. Pope had been sacrificed and all the blood shed from Yorktown to Malvern Hill seemed to have been utterly in vain. But the minor keys, upon which I played my infinitesimal note in the great anthem of war and victory which rang through the land when these two fearful forces met and closed, with gun-lock kissing gun-lock across the rocky bed of Antietam, are yet known only to a few. Washington was filled with dismay, and all the North was moved as a tempest stirs a forest.
Maryland lay temptingly in view, and Lee and Jackson with the flower of the rebel army marched for its ripening fields. Who it was that whispered hastily on Saturday night, September 13,—“Harper’s Ferry, not a moment to be lost”—I have never dared to name.
In thirty minutes I was waiting the always kindly spoken “Come in,” of my patron saint, Major, now Quartermaster-General, Rucker.
“Major,” I said—“I want to go to Harper’s Ferry; can I go?”
“Perhaps so,” he replied, with genial but doubtful expression. “Perhaps so; do you want a conveyance?”
“Yes,” I said.
“But an army wagon is the only vehicle that will reach there with any burden in safety. I can send you one of these to-morrow morning.”
I said, “I will be ready.”
But here was to begin a new experience for me. I was to ride eighty miles in an army wagon, and straight into battle and danger at that.
I could take no female companion, no friend, but the stout working-men I had use for.
You, who are accustomed to see a coach and a pair of fine horses with a well-dressed, gentlemanly driver draw up to your door, will scarcely appreciate the sensation with which I watched the approach of the long and high, white-covered, tortoise-motioned vehicle, with its string of little, frisky, long-eared animals, with the broad-shouldered driver astride, and the eternal jerk of the single rein by which he navigated his craft up to my door.
The time, you will remember, was Sunday; the place, 7th Street, just off Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington City.
Then and there, my vehicle was loaded, with boxes, bags, and parcels, and, last of all, I found a place for myself and the four men who were to go with me.
I took no Saratoga trunk, but remembered, at the last moment, to tie up a few articles in my handkerchief.
Thus equipped, and seated, my chain of little uneasy animals commenced to straighten itself, and soon brought us into the center of Pennsylvania Avenue, in full gaze of the whole city in its best attire, and on its way to church.
Thus all day we rattled on over the stones and dikes, and up and down the hills of Maryland.
At nightfall we turned into an open field, and, dismounting, built a camp-fire, prepared supper, and retired, I to my work in my wagon, the men wrapped in their blankets, camping about me.
All night an indistinct roar of artillery sounded upon our ears, and waking or sleeping, we were conscious of trouble ahead; but it was well for our rest that no messenger came to tell us how death reveled among our brave troops that night.
Before daybreak, we had breakfasted, and were on our way. You will not infer that, because by ourselves, we were alone upon the road. We were directly in the midst of a train of army wagons, at least ten miles in length, moving in solid column—the Government supplies and ammunition, food, and medicine for an army in battle.
Weary and sick from their late exposures and hardships, the men were falling by the wayside, faint, pale, and often dying.
I busied myself as I rode on hour by hour in cutting loaves of bread in slices and passing them to the pale, haggard wrecks as they sat by the roadside, or staggered on to avoid capture, and at each little village we entered, I purchased all the bread its inhabitants would sell.
Horses as well as men had suffered and their dead bodies strewed the wayside.
My poor words can never describe to you the consternation and horror with which we descended from our wagon, and trod, there in the mountain pass, that field of death.
There, where we now walked with peaceful feet, twelve hours before the ground had rocked with carnage. There in the darkness God’s angels of wrath and death had swept and, foe facing foe, the souls of men went out. And there, side by side, stark and cold in death mingled the Northern Blue and the Southern Gray.
To such of you as have stood in the midst or followed in the track of armies and witnessed the strange and dreadful confusion of recent battle-grounds, I need not describe this field. And to you who have not, no description would ever avail.
The giant rocks, hanging above our heads, seemed to frown upon the scene, and the sighing trees which hung lovingly upon their rugged edge drooped low and wept their pitying dews upon the livid brows and ghastly wounds beneath.
Climbing hills and clambering over ledges we sought in vain for some poor wretch in whom life had still left the power to suffer. Not one remained, and, grateful for this, but shocked and sick of heart, we returned to our waiting conveyance.
So far as Harper’s Ferry was concerned, her advance information appeared to have come too late to be of any value. The number of wounded was not large, and these had all been taken to Frederick, Maryland. Only the day before, Stonewall Jackson and his men had passed through, and Barbara Frietchie had refused to haul down her flag. There had not been many wounded, anyway; the Federal army simply had failed to fight at Harper’s Ferry. The word “morale” was not then in common use, but that was what the Union army had lost. On Monday, September 15, 1862, was fought the battle of South Mountain, Maryland. There Hooker and Franklin and Reno were defeated with a loss of 325 men killed, 1403 wounded, and 85 prisoners. There were few prisoners as compared with Harper’s Ferry, but that was partly because the mountainous country gave the defeated Union soldiers a better chance to escape. The defeat was beyond question, and General Reno was killed. While Clara Barton was driving from Harper’s Ferry where she had expected to find a battle, she came suddenly upon a battle-field, that of South Mountain. There she did her ministering work. But Harper’s Ferry and South Mountain were both preliminary to the real battle of which she had had her Washington warning. And now she made a discovery. If she was ever to get to the front in time to be of the greatest possible service, she must short-circuit the ordinary military method which would have put her and her equipment among the baggage-wagons. For her the motto from this time on was, “Follow the cannon.” This gave her something approaching an open road, and afforded her the opportunity which she was just learning how to utilize with greatest efficiency.
The increase of stragglers along the road [Miss Barton recalled] was alarming, showing that our army was weary, and lacked not only physical strength, but confidence and spirit.
And why should they not? Always defeated! Always on the retreat! I was almost demoralized myself! And I had just commenced.
I have already spoken of the great length of the army train, and that we could no more change our position than one of the planets. Unless we should wait and fall in the rear, we could not advance a single wagon.
And for the benefit of those who may not understand, I may say that the order of the train was, first, ammunition; next, food and clothing for well troops; and finally, the hospital supplies. Thus, in case of the battle the needed stores for the army, according to the slow, cautious movement of such bodies, must be from two to three days in coming up.
Meanwhile, as usual, our men must languish and die. Something must be done to gain time. And I resorted to strategy. We found an early resting-place, supped by our camp-fire, and slept again among the dews and damps.
At one o’clock, when everything was still, we arose, breakfasted, harnessed, and moved on past the whole train, which like ourselves had camped for the night. At daylight we had gained ten miles and were up with the artillery and in advance even of the ammunition.
All that weary, dusty day I followed the cannon, and nightfall brought us up with the great Army of the Potomac, 80,000 men resting upon their arms in the face of a foe equal in number, sullen, straitened, and desperate.
Closely following the guns we drew up where they did, among the smoke of the thousand camp-fires, men hastening to and fro, and the atmosphere loaded with noxious vapors, till it seemed the very breath of pestilence. We were upon the left wing of the army, and this was the last evening’s rest of Burnside’s men. To how many hundred it proved the last rest upon the earth, the next day’s record shows.
In all this vast assemblage I saw no other trace of womankind. I was faint, but could not eat; weary, but could not sleep; depressed, but could not weep.
So I climbed into my wagon, tied down the cover, dropped down in the little nook I had occupied so long, and prayed God with all the earnestness of my soul to stay the morrow’s strife or send us victory. And for my poor self, that He impart somewhat of wisdom and strength to my heart, nerve to my arm, speed to my feet, and fill my hands for the terrible duties of the coming day. Heavy and sad I awaited its approach.
The battle of Antietam occurred on September 16 and 17, 1862. It was the first battle in the East that roused to any considerable degree the forlorn hope of the friends of the Union. It was the first real Eastern victory for the Union army. It was not as decided a victory as it ought to have been, but it was a victory. It put heart into Abraham Lincoln and certified to his conscience that the time had come to redeem the promise he had made to God—that if He would give victory to the Union arms Lincoln would free the slaves. McClellan did not follow up his advantage as he should have done and make that victory triumphant. But he did something other than delay and retreat, and he put some heart into the Union army when it discovered that it need not forever be on the defensive, nor always suffer defeat. In this great, and, in spite of its limitations, victorious, battle, Clara Barton was on the ground before the first gun was fired, and she did not leave the field until the last wounded man had been cared for. At the outset she watched the battle, but almost immediately she laid down her field-glasses, went to the place where the wounded were being brought in, and was able to perform her work of ministration without a single hour’s delay.
She told her story of the conflict as she saw it:
The battle commenced on the right and already with the aid of field-glasses we saw our own forces, led by “Fighting Joe” [Hooker], overborne and falling back.
Burnside commenced to send cavalry and artillery to his aid, and, thinking our place might be there, we followed them around eight miles, turning into a cornfield near a house and barn, and stopping in the rear of the last gun, which completed the terrible line of artillery which ranged diagonally in the rear of Hooker’s army. That day a garden wall only separated us. The infantry were already driven back two miles, and stood under cover of the guns. The fighting had been fearful. We had met wounded men, walking or borne to the rear for the last two miles. But around the old barn there lay, too badly wounded to admit of removal, some three hundred thus early in the day, for it was scarce ten o’clock.
We loosened our mules and commenced our work. The corn was so high as to conceal the house, which stood some distance to the right, but, judging that a path which I observed must lead to it, and also that surgeons must be operating there, I took my arms full of stimulants and bandages and followed the opening.
Arriving at a little wicker gate, I found the dooryard of a small house, and myself face to face with one of the kindest and noblest surgeons I have ever met, Dr. Dunn, of Conneautville, Pennsylvania.
Speechless both, for an instant, he at length threw up his hands with “God has indeed remembered us! How did you get from Virginia here so soon? And again to supply our necessities! And they are terrible. We have nothing but our instruments and the little chloroform we brought in our pockets. We have torn up the last sheets we could find in this house. We have not a bandage, rag, lint, or string, and all these shell-wounded men bleeding to death.”
Upon the porch stood four tables, with an etherized patient upon each, a surgeon standing over him with his box of instruments, and a bunch of green corn leaves beside him.
With what joy I laid my precious burden down among them, and thought that never before had linen looked so white, or wine so red. Oh! be grateful, ladies, that God put it in your hearts to perform the work you did in those days. How doubly sanctified was the sacred old household linen woven by the hands of the sainted mother long gone to her reward. For you arose the tender blessings of those grateful men, which linger in my memory as faithfully to-night as do the bugle notes which called them to their doom.
Thrice that day was the ground in front of us contested, lost, and won, and twice our men were driven back under cover of that fearful range of guns, and each time brought its hundreds of wounded to our crowded ground.
A little after noon, the enemy made a desperate attempt to regain what had been lost; Hooker, Sedgwick, Dana, Richardson, Hartsuff, and Mansfield had been borne wounded from the field and the command of the right wing devolved upon General Howard.
The smoke became so dense as to obscure our sight, and the hot, sulphurous breath of battle dried our tongues and parched our lips to bleeding.
We were in a slight hollow, and all shell which did not break over our guns in front came directly among or over us, bursting above our heads or burying themselves in the hills beyond.
A man lying upon the ground asked for a drink; I stopped to give it, and, having raised him with my right hand, was holding him.
Just at this moment a bullet sped its free and easy way between us, tearing a hole in my sleeve and found its way into his body. He fell back dead. There was no more to be done for him and I left him to his rest. I have never mended that hole in my sleeve. I wonder if a soldier ever does mend a bullet hole in his coat?
The patient endurance of these men was most astonishing. As many as could be were carried into the barn, as a slight protection against random shot. Just outside the door lay a man wounded in the face, the ball having entered the lower maxillary on the left side and lodged among the bones of the right cheek. His imploring look drew me to him, when, placing his finger upon the sharp protuberance, he said, “Lady, will you tell me what this is that burns so?” I replied that it must be the ball which had been too far spent to cut its way entirely through.
“It is terribly painful,” he said. “Won’t you take it out?”
I said I would go to the tables for a surgeon. “No! No!” he said, catching my dress. “They cannot come to me. I must wait my turn, for this is a little wound. You can get the ball. There is a knife in your pocket. Please take the ball out for me.”
This was a new call. I had never severed the nerves and fibers of human flesh, and I said I could not hurt him so much. He looked up, with as nearly a smile as such a mangled face could assume, saying, “You cannot hurt me, dear lady, I can endure any pain that your hands can create. Please do it. It will relieve me so much.”
I could not withstand his entreaty and, opening the best blade of my pocket-knife, prepared for the operation. Just at his head lay a stalwart orderly sergeant from Illinois, with a face beaming with intelligence and kindness, and who had a bullet directly through the fleshy part of both thighs. He had been watching the scene with great interest and, when he saw me commence to raise the poor fellow’s head, and no one to support it, with a desperate effort he succeeded in raising himself to a sitting posture, exclaiming as he did so, “I will help do that.” Shoving himself along the ground he took the wounded head in his hands and held it while I extracted the ball and washed and bandaged the face.
I do not think a surgeon would have pronounced it a scientific operation, but that it was successful I dared to hope from the gratitude of the patient.
I assisted the sergeant to lie down again, brave and cheerful as he had risen, and passed on to others.
Returning in half an hour, I found him weeping, the great tears rolling diligently down his manly cheeks. I thought his effort had been too great for his strength and expressed my fears. “Oh! No! No! Madam,” he replied. “It is not for myself. I am very well, but,” pointing to another just brought in, he said, “this is my comrade, and he tells me that our regiment is all cut to pieces, that my captain was the last officer left, and he is dead.”
Oh, God! what a costly war! This man could laugh at pain, face death without a tremor, and yet weep like a child over the loss of his comrades and his captain.
At two o’clock my men came to tell me that the last loaf of bread had been cut and the last cracker pounded. We had three boxes of wine still unopened. What should they do?
“Open the wine and give that,” I said, “and God help us.”
The next instant an ejaculation from Sergeant Field, who had opened the first box, drew my attention, and, to my astonished gaze, the wine had been packed in nicely sifted Indian meal.
If it had been gold dust it would have seemed poor in comparison. I had no words. No one spoke. In silence the men wiped their eyes and resumed their work.
Of twelve boxes of wine which we carried, the first nine, when opened, were found packed in sawdust, the last three, when all else was gone, in Indian meal.
A woman would not hesitate long under circumstances like these.
This was an old farmhouse. Six large kettles were picked up and set over fires, almost as quickly as I can tell it, and I was mixing water and meal for gruel.
It occurred to us to explore the cellar. The chimney rested on an arch, and, forcing the door, we discovered three barrels and a bag. “They are full,” said the sergeant, and, rolling one into the light, found that it bore the mark of Jackson’s army. These three barrels of flour and a bag of salt had been stored there by the rebel army during its upward march.
I shall never experience such a sensation of wealth and competency again, from utter poverty to such riches.
All that night my thirty men (for my corps of workers had increased to that number during the day) carried buckets of hot gruel for miles down the line to the wounded and dying where they fell.
This time, profiting by experience, we had lanterns to hang in and around the barn, and, having directed it to be done, I went to the house and found the surgeon in charge, sitting alone, beside a table, upon which he rested his elbow, apparently meditating upon a bit of tallow candle which flickered in the center.
Approaching carefully, I said, “You are tired, Doctor.” He started up with a look almost savage, “Tired! Yes, I am tired, tired of such heartlessness, such carelessness!” Turning full upon me, he continued: “Think of the condition of things. Here are at least one thousand wounded men, terribly wounded, five hundred of whom cannot live till daylight, without attention. That two inches of candle is all I have or can get. What can I do? How can I endure it?”
I took him by the arm, and, leading him to the door, pointed in the direction of the barn where the lanterns glistened like stars among the waving corn.
“What is that?” he exclaimed.
“The barn is lighted,” I said, “and the house will be directly.”
“Who did it?”
“I, Doctor.”
“Where did you get them?”
“Brought them with me.”
“How many have you?”
“All you want—four boxes.”
He looked at me a moment, as if waking from a dream, turned away without a word, and never alluded to the circumstances, but the deference which he paid me was almost painful.
During a lecture in the West, Miss Barton related this incident, and as she closed a gentleman sprang upon the stage, and, addressing the audience, exclaimed: “Ladies and gentlemen, if I never have acknowledged that favor, I will do it now. I am that surgeon.”
Darkness [Miss Barton continues] brought silence and peace, and respite and rest to our gallant men. As they had risen, regiment by regiment, from their grassy beds in the morning, so at night the fainting remnant again sank down on the trampled blood-stained earth, the weary to sleep, and the wounded to die.
Through the long starlit night we wrought and hoped and prayed. But it was only when in the hush of the following day, as we glanced over that vast Aceldama, that we learned at what a fearful cost the gallant Union army had won the battle of Antietam.
Antietam! With its eight miles of camping armies, face to face; 160,000 men to spring up at dawn like the old Scot from the heather! Its miles of artillery shaking the earth like a chain of Ætnas! Its ten hours of uninterrupted battle! Its thunder and its fire! The sharp, unflinching order,—“Hold the Bridge, boys,—always the Bridge.” At length, the quiet! The pale moonlight on its cooling guns! The weary men, the dying and the dead! The flag of truce that buried our enemies slain, and Antietam was fought, and won, and the foe turned back!
Clara Barton remained on the battle-field of Antietam until her supplies were exhausted and she was completely worn out. Not only fatigue but fever came upon her, and she was carried back to Washington apparently sick. But the call of duty gave her fresh strength, and she was soon wondering where the next battle was to be and planning to be on the field. Almost the only entry in her diary in the autumn of 1862, aside from memoranda of wounded men and similar entries relating to people other than herself, is one of October 23, which she began in some detail, but broke off abruptly. She records that she “left Washington for Harper’s Ferry expecting to meet a battle there. Have taken four teams of Colonel Rucker loaded at his office, traveled and camped as usual, reaching Harper’s Ferry the third day. At the first end of the pontoon bridge one of Peter’s mules ran off and we delayed the progress of the army for twenty minutes to be extricated.”
The rest of the entry contains the names of her drivers, details of the overturned wagon, and other memoranda. Two things are of interest in this fragmentary record. One is the definiteness of the method which she now had adopted of going where she “expected to meet a battle.” The other is the fact that a delay of twenty minutes, caused by an accident to one of her wagons on the pontoon bridge, illustrates a reason why, in general, armies cannot permit even so necessary things as supplies for the wounded to get in the way of the free movement of troops. However, this delay was quite exceptional. She did not usually cause any inconvenience of this sort, nor did it in this instance result in any serious harm. On this occasion she was provided with an ambulance for her own use. That thoughtful provision for her convenience and means of conserving her energy, was provided for her by Quartermaster-General Rucker.
On this journey the question was decided who was really in command of her part of the expedition. In one of her lectures she described her associates on this and subsequent expeditions:
There may be those present who are curious to know how eight or ten rough, stout men, who knew nothing of me, received the fact that they were to drive their teams under the charge of a lady.
This question has been so often asked in private that I deem it proper to answer it publicly.
Well, the various expressions of their faces afforded a study. They were not soldiers, but civilians in Government employ. Drovers, butchers, hucksters, mule-breakers, probably not one of them had ever passed an hour in what could be termed “ladies’ society,” in his life. But every man had driven through the whole peninsular campaign. Every one of them had taken his team unharmed out of that retreat, and had sworn an oath never to drive another step in Virginia.
They were brave and skillful, understood their business to perfection, but had no art. They said and looked what they thought; and I understood them at a glance.
These teamsters proposed to go into camp at four o’clock in the afternoon, and start when they got ready in the morning, but she first established her authority over them, and then cooked them a hot supper, the first and last she ever cooked for army teamsters, and they came to her later in the evening, apologized for their obstinacy, and were ready to drive her anywhere.
“We come to tell you we are ashamed of ourselves” [their leader said].
I thought honest confession good for the soul, and did not interrupt him.
“The truth is,” he continued, “in the first place we didn’t want to come. There’s fighting ahead and we’ve seen enough of that for men who don’t carry muskets, only whips; and then we never seen a train under charge of a woman before and we couldn’t understand it, and we didn’t like it, and we thought we’d break it up, and we’ve been mean and contrary all day, and said a good many hard things and you’ve treated us like gentlemen. We hadn’t no right to expect that supper from you, a better meal than we’ve had in two years. And you’ve been as polite to us as if we’d been the General and his staff, and it makes us ashamed. And we’ve come to ask your forgiveness. We shan’t trouble you no more.”
My forgiveness was easily obtained. I reminded them that as men it was their duty to go where the country had need of them. As for my being a woman, they would get accustomed to that. And I assured them that, as long as I had any food, I would share it with them. That, when they were hungry and supperless, I should be; that if harm befell them, I should care for them; if sick, I should nurse them; and that, under all circumstances, I should treat them like gentlemen.
They listened silently, and, when I saw the rough, woolen coat-sleeves drawing across their faces, it was one of the best moments of my life.
Bidding me “good-night” they withdrew, excepting the leader, who went to my ambulance, hung a lighted lantern in the top, arranged the few quilts inside for my bed, assisted me up the steps, buckled the canvas down snugly outside, covered the fire safely for morning, wrapped his blanket around him, and lay down a few feet from me on the ground.
At daylight I became conscious of low voices and stifled sounds, and soon discovered that these men were endeavoring to speak low and feed and harness their teams quietly, not to disturb me.
On the other side I heard the crackling of blazing chestnut rails and the rattling of dishes, and George came with a bucket of fresh water, to undo my buckle door latches, and announce that breakfast was nearly ready.
I had cooked my last meal for my drivers. These men remained with me six months through frost and snow and march and camp and battle; and nursed the sick, dressed the wounded, soothed the dying, and buried the dead; and if possible grew kinder and gentler every day.
There was one serious difficulty about following advance information and attempting to be on the battle-field when the battle occurred. The battle does not always occur at the time and place expected. The battle at Harper’s Ferry in October, 1862, did not take place as planned. General Lee may have received the same advance information which was conveyed to Clara Barton. At all events, he was not among those present when the battle was scheduled to take place. He withdrew his army and waited until he was ready to fight. McClellan decided to follow Lee, and Clara Barton moved with the army. As she moved, she cared for the sick, supplying them from her own stores, returning to Washington with a body of sick men about the first of December. She was suffering from a felon on her hand from the first of November until near the end of that month. Her hand was lanced in the open field, and she suffered from the cold, but did not complain.
She did not remain long in Washington, but returned by way of Acquia Creek and met the army at Falmouth. From Falmouth she wrote a letter to some of the women who had been assisting her, and sent it by the hand of the Reverend C. M. Wells, one of her reliable associates. It contains references to her sore finger and to the nature of accommodations:
Camp near Falmouth, Va.
Headquarters General Sturgis, 2nd DivisionDecember 8th, 1862
Messrs. Brown & Co.
Dear Friends:
Mr. Wells returns to-morrow and I improve the opportunity to send a line by him to you, not feeling quite certain if posted matter reaches directly when sent from the army.
We reached Acquia Creek safely in the time anticipated, and to my great joy learned immediately that our old friend Captain (Major) Hall (of the 21st) was Quartermaster. As soon as the boat was unloaded, he came on board and spent the remainder of the evening with me.—We had a home chat, I assure you. Remained till the next day, sent a barrel of apples, etc., up to the Captain’s quarters, and proceeded with the remainder of our luggage, for which it is needless to say ready transportation was found, and the Captain chided me for having left anything behind at the depot, as I told him I had done. On reaching Falmouth Station we found another old friend, Captain Bailey, in charge, who instituted himself as watch over the goods until he sent them all up to Headquarters. My ambulance came through that P.M., but for fear it might not, General Sturgis had his taken down for me, and had supper arranged and a splendid serenade. I don’t know how we could have had a warmer “welcome home,” as the officers termed it.
Headquarters are in the dooryard of a farmhouse, one room of which is occupied by Miss G. and myself. My wagons are a little way from me, out of sight, and I am wishing for a tent and stove to pitch and live near them. The weather is cold, and the ground covered with snow, but I could make me comfortable with a good tent, floor, and stove, and should prefer it to a room in a rebel house and one so generally occupied.
The 21st are a few rods from me; many of the officers call to see me every day. Colonel Clark is very neighborly; he is looking finely now; he was in this P.M., and was going in search of Colonel Morse whom he thought to be a mile or two distant. I learned to-night that the 15th are only some three miles away; the 36th I cannot find yet. I have searched hard for them and shall get on their track soon, I trust.
Of army movements nothing can be said with certainty; no two persons, not even the generals, agree in reference to the future programme. The snow appears to have deranged the plans very seriously. I have received calls from two generals to-day, and in the course of conversation I discovered that their views were entirely different. General Burnside stood a long time in front of my door to-day, but to my astonishment he did not express his opinion—STRANGE!
I have not suffered for want of the boots yet, but should find them convenient, I presume, and shall be glad to see them. The sore finger is much the same; not very troublesome, although somewhat so. If you desire to reach this point, I think you would find no difficulty after getting past the guard at Washington—at Acquia you would find all right I am sure.
I can think of a host of things I wish you could take out to me.
In spite of her wish that she might have had a tent, and so have avoided living in a captured house, her residence was the Lacy house on the shore of the Rappahannock and close to Fredericksburg. There was nothing uncertain about her information this time. She knew when the battle was to occur, and at two o’clock in the morning she wrote a letter to her cousin, Vira Stone, just before the storm of battle broke:
Headquarters 2nd Division
Army of the Potomac
Camp near Falmouth, Va.December 12, 1862, 2 o’clock A.M.
Dear Cousin Vira:
Five minutes’ time with you, and God only knows what that five minutes might be worth to the—may be—doomed thousands sleeping around me. It is the night before a “battle.” The enemy, Fredericksburg, and its mighty entrenchments lie before us—the river between. At to-morrow’s dawn our troops will essay to cross and the guns of the enemy will sweep their frail bridges at every breath. The moon is shining through the soft haze with a brightness almost prophetic; for the last half-hour I have stood alone in the awful stillness of its glimmering light gazing upon the strange, sad scene around me striving to say, “Thy will, O God, be done.” The camp-fires blaze with unwonted brightness, the sentry’s tread is still but quick, the scores of little shelter tents are dark and still as death; no wonder, for, as I gazed sorrowfully upon them, I thought I could almost hear the slow flap of the grim messenger’s wings as one by one he sought and selected his victims for the morning’s sacrifice.
Sleep, weary ones, sleep and rest for to-morrow’s toil! Oh, sleep and visit in dreams once more the loved ones nestling at home! They may yet live to dream of you, cold, lifeless, and bloody; but this dream, soldier, is thy last; paint it brightly, dream it well. Oh, Northern mothers, wives, and sisters, all unconscious of the peril of the hour, would to Heaven that I could bear for you the concentrated woe which is so soon to follow; would that Christ would teach my soul a prayer that would plead to the Father for grace sufficient for you all! God pity and strengthen you every one.
Mine are not the only waking hours; the light yet burns brightly in our kind-hearted General’s tent, where he pens what may be a last farewell to his wife and children, and thinks sadly of his fated men. Already the roll of the moving artillery is sounding in my ears. The battle draws near and I must catch one hour’s sleep for to-day’s labor.
Good-night, and Heaven grant you strength for your more peaceful and terrible, but not less weary, days than mine.
Clara
All her apprehensions were less than the truth. It was a terrible battle, and a disheartening disaster. The Union army lost 1284 in killed, 9600 wounded, and 1769 missing. The memories of Fredericksburg remained with her distinct and terrible to the day of her death. She described the battle and the events which followed it in her war lectures:
We found ourselves beside a broad, muddy river, and a little canvas city grew up in a night upon its banks. And there we sat and waited “while the world wondered.” Ay, it did more than wonder! It murmured, it grumbled, it cried shame, to sit there and shiver under the canvas. “Cross over the river and occupy those brick houses on the other shore!” The murmurs grew to a clamor!
Our gallant leader heard them and his gentle heart grew sore as he looked upon his army that he loved as it loved him and looked upon those fearful sights beyond. Carelessness or incapacity at the capital had baffled his best-laid plans till time had made his foes a wall of adamant. Still the country murmured. You, friends, have not forgotten how, for these were the dark days of old Fredericksburg, and our little canvas city was Falmouth.
Finally, one soft, hazy winter’s day the army prepared for an attack; but there was neither boat nor bridge, and the sluggish tide rolled dark between.
The men of Hooker and Franklin were right and left, but here in the center came the brave men of the silvery-haired Sumner.
Drawn up in line they wait in the beautiful grounds of the stately mansion whose owner, Lacy, had long sought the other side, and stood that day aiming engines of destruction at the home of his youth and the graves of his household.
There on the second portico I stood and watched the engineers as they moved forward to construct a pontoon bridge. It will be remembered that the rebel army occupying the heights of Fredericksburg previous to the attack was very cautious about revealing the position of its guns.
A few boats were fastened and the men marched quickly on with timbers and planks. For a few rods it proved a success, and scarcely could the impatient troops be restrained from rending the air with shouts of triumph.
On marches the little band with brace and plank, but never to be laid by them. A rain of musket balls has swept their ranks and the brave fellows lie level with the bridge or float down the stream.
No living thing stirs on the opposite bank. No enemy is in sight. Whence comes this rain of death?
Maddened by the fate of their comrades, others seize the work and march onward to their doom. For now, the balls are hurling thick and fast, not only at the bridge, but over and beyond to the limit of their range—crashing through the trees, the windows and doors of the Lacy house. And ever here and there a man drops in the waiting ranks, silently as a snowflake. And his comrades bear him in for help, or back for a grave.
There on the lower bank under a slouched hat stands the man of honest heart and genial face that a soldier could love and honor even through defeat. The ever-trusted, gallant Burnside. Hark—that deep-toned order rising above the heads of his men: “Bring the guns to bear and shell them out.”
Then rolled the thunder and the fire. For two long hours the shot and shell hurled through the roofs and leveled the spires of Fredericksburg. Then the little band of engineers resumed its work, but ere ten spaces of the bridge were gained, they fell like grass before the scythe.
For an instant all stand aghast; then ran the murmurs: “The cellars are filled with sharp-shooters and our shell will never reach them.”
But once more over the heads of his men rose that deep-toned order: “Man the boats.”
Into the boats like tigers then spring the 7th Michigan.
“Row!! Row!! Ply for your lives, boys.” And they do. But mark! They fall, some into the boats, some out. Other hands seize the oars and strain and tug with might and main. Oh, how slow the seconds drag! How long we have held our breath.
Almost across—under the bluffs—and out of range! Thank God—they’ll land!
Ah, yes; but not all. Mark the windows and doors of those houses above them. See the men swarming from them armed to the teeth and rushing to the river.
They’ve reached the bluffs above the boats. Down point the muskets. Ah, that rain of shot and shell and flame!
Out of the boats waist-deep in the water; straight through the fire. Up, up the bank the boys in blue! Grimly above, that line of gray!
Down pours the shot. Up, up the blue, till hand to hand like fighting demons they wrestle on the edge.
Can we breathe yet? No! Still they struggle. Ah, yes, they break, they fly, up through the street and out of sight, pursuer and pursued.
It were long to tell of that night crossing and the next terrible day of fire and blood. And when the battle broke o’er field and grove, like a resistless flood daylight exposed Fredericksburg with its fourth-day flag of truce, its dead, starving, and wounded, frozen to the ground. The wounded were brought to me, frozen, for days after, and our commissions and their supplies at Washington with no effective organization or power to go beyond! The many wounded lay, uncared for, on the cold snow.
Although the Lacy house was exposed to fire she was not permitted to remain within the shelter of its walls. While the fight was at its hottest, she crossed the river under fire for a place of greater danger and of greater need:
At ten o’clock of the battle day when the rebel fire was hottest, the shell rolling down every street, and the bridge under the heavy cannonade, a courier dashed over and, rushing up the steps of the Lacy house, placed in my hand a crumpled, bloody slip of paper, a request from the lion-hearted old surgeon on the opposite shore, establishing his hospitals in the very jaws of death.
The uncouth penciling said: “Come to me. Your place is here.”
The faces of the rough men working at my side, which eight weeks ago had flushed with indignation at the very thought of being controlled by a woman, grew ashy white as they guessed the nature of the summons, and the lips which had cursed and pouted in disgust trembled as they begged me to send them, but save myself. I could only permit them to go with me if they chose, and in twenty minutes we were rocking across the swaying bridge, the water hissing with shot on either side.
Over into that city of death, its roofs riddled by shell, its very church a crowded hospital, every street a battle-line, every hill a rampart, every rock a fortress, and every stone wall a blazing line of forts!
Oh, what a day’s work was that! How those long lines of blue, rank upon rank, charged over the open acres, up to the very mouths of those blazing guns, and how like grain before the sickle they fell and melted away.
An officer stepped to my side to assist me over the débris at the end of the bridge. While our hands were raised in the act of stepping down, a piece of an exploding shell hissed through between us, just below our arms, carrying away a portion of both the skirts of his coat and my dress, rolling along the ground a few rods from us like a harmless pebble into the water.
The next instant a solid shot thundered over our heads, a noble steed bounded in the air, and, with his gallant rider, rolled in the dirt, not thirty feet in the rear! Leaving the kind-hearted officer, I passed on alone to the hospital. In less than a half-hour he was brought to me—dead.
I mention these circumstances not as specimens of my own bravery. Oh, no! I beg you will not place that construction upon them, for I never professed anything beyond ordinary courage, and a thousand times preferred safety to danger.
But I mention them that those of you, who have never seen a battle, may the better realize the perils through which these brave men passed, who for four long years bore their country’s bloody banner in the face of death, and stood, a living wall of flesh and blood, between the invading traitor and your peaceful homes.
In the afternoon of Sunday an officer came hurriedly to tell me that in a church across the way lay one of his men shot in the face the day before. His wounds were bleeding slowly and, the blood drying and hardening about his nose and mouth, he was in immediate danger of suffocation.
(Friends, this may seem to you repulsive, but I assure you that many a brave and beautiful soldier has died of this alone.)
Seizing a basin of water and a sponge, I ran to the church, to find the report only too true. Among hundreds of comrades lay my patient. For any human appearance above his head and shoulders, it might as well have been anything but a man.
I knelt by him and commenced with fear and trembling lest some unlucky movement close the last aperture for breath. After some hours’ labor, I began to recognize features. They seemed familiar. With what impatience I wrought. Finally my hand wiped away the last obstruction. An eye opened, and there to my gaze was the sexton of my old home church!
I have remarked that every house was a hospital. Passing from one to another during the tumult of Saturday, I waited for a regiment of infantry to sweep on its way to the heights. Being alone, and the only woman visible among that moving sea of men, I naturally attracted the attention of the old veteran, Provost Marshal General Patrick, who, mistaking me for a resident of the city who had remained in her home until the crashing shot had driven her into the street, dashed through the waiting ranks to my side, and, bending down from his saddle, said in his kindliest tones, “You are alone and in great danger, Madam. Do you want protection?”
Amused at his gallant mistake, I humored it by thanking him, as I turned to the ranks, adding that I believed myself the best protected woman in the United States.
The soldiers near me caught my words, and responding with “That’s so! That’s so!” set up a cheer. This in turn was caught by the next line and so on, line after line, till the whole army joined in the shout, no one knowing what he was cheering at, but never doubting there was a victory somewhere. The gallant old General, taking in the situation, bowed low his bared head, saying, as he galloped away, “I believe you are right, Madam.”
It would be difficult for persons in ordinary life to realize the troubles arising from want of space merely for wounded men to occupy when gathered together for surgical treatment and care. You may suggest that “all out-of-doors” ought to be large, and so it would seem, but the fact did not always prove so. Civilized men seek shelter in sickness, and of this there was ever a scarcity.
Twelve hundred men were crowded into the Lacy house, which contained but twelve rooms. They covered every foot of the floors and porticoes, and even lay on the stair landings! A man who could find opportunity to lie between the legs of a table thought himself lucky: he was not likely to be stepped on. In a common cupboard, with four shelves, five men lay, and were fed and attended. Three lived to be removed, and two died of their wounds.
Think of trying to lie still and die quietly, lest you fall out of a bed six feet high!
Among the wounded of the 7th Michigan was one Faulkner, of Ashtabula County, Ohio, a mere lad, shot through the lungs and, to all appearances, dying. When brought in, he could swallow nothing, breathed painfully, and it was with great difficulty that he gave me his name and residence. He could not lie down, but sat leaning against the wall in the corner of the room.
I observed him carefully as I hurried past from one room to another, and finally thought he had ceased to breathe. At this moment another man with a similar wound was taken in on a stretcher by his comrades, who sought in vain for a spot large enough to lay him down, and appealed to me. I could only tell them that when that poor boy in the corner was removed, they could set him down in his place. They went to remove him, but, to the astonishment of all, he objected, opened his eyes, and persisted in retaining his corner, which he did for some two weeks, when, finally, a mere bundle of skin and bones, for he gave small evidence of either flesh or blood, he was wrapped in a blanket and taken away in an ambulance to Washington, with a bottle of milk punch in his blouse, the only nourishment he could take.
On my return to Washington, three months later, a messenger came from Lincoln Hospital to say that the men of Ward 17 wanted to see me. I returned with him, and as I entered the ward seventy men saluted me, standing, such as could, others rising feebly in their beds, and falling back—exhausted with the effort.
Every man had left his blood in Fredericksburg—every one was from the Lacy house. My hand had dressed every wound—many of them in the first terrible moments of agony. I had prepared their food in the snow and winds of December and fed them like children.
How dear they had grown to me in their sufferings, and the three great cheers that greeted my entrance into that hospital ward were dearer than the applause. I would not exchange their memory for the wildest hurrahs that ever greeted the ear of conqueror or king. When the first greetings were over and the agitation had subsided somewhat, a young man walked up to me with no apparent wound, with bright complexion, and in good flesh. There was certainly something familiar in his face, but I could not recall him, until, extending his hand with a smile, he said, “I am Riley Faulkner, of the 7th Michigan. I didn’t die, and the milk punch lasted all the way to Washington!”
The author once inquired of Miss Barton how she dressed for these expeditions. She dressed simply, she said, so that she could get about easily, but her costume did not greatly differ from that of the ordinary woman of the period. She added humorously that her wardrobe was not wholly a matter of choice. Her clothes underwent such hard usage that nothing lasted very long, and she was glad to wear almost anything she could get.
This was not wholly satisfactory, for those were the days of hoop-skirts and other articles of feminine attire which had no possible place in her work. From Mrs. Vassall the author obtained somewhat more explicit information. She said:
When Clara went to the front, she dressed in a plain black print skirt with a jacket. She wished to dress so that she could easily get about and not consume much time in dressing. Her clothing received hard usage, and when she returned from any campaign to Washington, she was in need of a new outfit. At one time the women of Oxford sent her a box for her own personal use. Friends in Oxford furnished the material, and Annie Childs made the dresses. The box was delivered at her room during her absence, and she returned from the field, weary and wet, her hair soaked and falling down her back, and entered her cold and not very cheerful room. There she found this box with its complete outfit, and kneeling beside it she burst into happy tears.
The author counts it especially fortunate that he has been able to find a letter from Clara relating to this very experience, which was on the occasion of her return from the battle of Fredericksburg. It was addressed to Annie Childs, and dated four months later:
Port Royal, May 28th, 1863
My dear Annie:
I remember, four long months ago, one cold, dreary, windy day, I dragged me out from a chilly street-car that had found me ankle-deep in the mud of the 6th Street wharf, and up the slippery street and my long flights of stairs into a room, cheerless, in confusion, and alone, looking in most respects as I had left it some months before, with the exception of a mysterious box which stood unopened in the middle of the floor. All things looked strange to me, for in that few months I had taken in so much that yet I had no clear views. The great artist had been at work upon my brain and sketched it all over with life scenes, and death scenes, never to be erased. The fires of Fredericksburg still blazed before my eyes, and her cannon still thundered at my ear, while away down in the depths of my heart I was smothering the groans and treasuring the prayers of her dead and dying heroes; worn, weak, and heartsick, I was home from Fredericksburg; and when, there, for the first time I looked at myself, shoeless, gloveless, ragged, and blood-stained, a new sense of desolation and pity and sympathy and weariness, all blended, swept over me with irresistible force, and, perfectly overpowered, I sank down upon the strange box, unquestioning its presence or import, and wept as I had never done since the soft, hazy, winter night that saw our attacking guns silently stealing their approach to the river, ready at the dawn to ring out the shout of death to the waiting thousands at their wheels.
I said I wept, and so I did, and gathered strength and calmness and consciousness—and finally the strange box, which had afforded me my first rest, began to claim my attention; it was clearly and handsomely marked to myself at Washington, and came by express—so much for the outside; and a few pries with a hatchet, to hands as well accustomed as mine, soon made the inside as visible, only for the neat paper which covered all. It was doubtless something sent to some soldier; pity I had not had it earlier—it might be too late now; he might be past his wants or the kind remembrances of the loved ones at home. The while I was busy in removing the careful paper wrappings a letter, addressed to me, opened—“From friends in Oxford and Worcester”—no signature. Mechanically I commenced lifting up, one after another, hoods, shoes, boots, gloves, skirts, handkerchiefs, collars, linen,—and that beautiful dress! look at it, all made—who—! Ah, there is no mistaking the workmanship—Annie’s scissors shaped and her skillful fingers fitted that. Now, I begin to comprehend; while I had been away in the snows and frosts and rains and mud of Falmouth, forgetting my friends, myself, to eat or sleep or rest, forgetting everything but my God and the poor suffering victims around me, these dear, kind friends, undismayed and not disheartened by the great national calamity which had overtaken them, mourning, perhaps, the loss of their own, had remembered me, and with open hearts and willing hands had prepared this noble, thoughtful gift for me at my return. It was too much, and this time, burying my face in the dear tokens around me, I wept again as heartily as before, but with very different sensations; a new chord was struck; my labors, slight and imperfect as they had been, had been appreciated; I was not alone; and then and there again I re-dedicated myself to my little work of humanity, pledging before God all that I have, all that I am, all that I can, and all that I hope to be, to the cause of Justice and Mercy and Patriotism, my Country, and my God. And cheered and sustained as I have been by the kind remembrances of old friends, the cordial greeting of new ones, and the tearful, grateful blessings of the thousands of noble martyrs to whose relief or comfort it has been my blessed privilege to add my mite, I feel that my cup of happiness is more than full. It is an untold privilege to have lived in this day when there is work to be done, and, still more, to possess health and strength to do it, and most of all to feel that I bear with me the kindly feelings and perhaps prayers of the noble mothers and sisters who have sent sons and brothers to fight the battles of the world in the armies of Freedom. Annie, if it is not asking too much, now that I have gathered up resolution enough to speak of the subject at all (for I have never been able to before), I would like to know to whom besides yourself I am indebted for these beautiful and valuable gifts. It is too tame and too little to say that I am thankful for them. You did not want that, but I will say that, God willing, I will yet wear them where none of the noble donors would be ashamed to have them seen. Some of those gifts shall yet see service if Heaven spare my life. With thanks I am the friend of my “Friends in Oxford and Worcester.”
Clara Barton