Following the American Civil War Sesquicentennial with day by day writings of the time, currently 1863.

Post image for Kate Cumming: A Journal of Hospital Life in the Confederate Army of Tennessee.

Kate Cumming: A Journal of Hospital Life in the Confederate Army of Tennessee.

January 3, 2014

Kate Cumming: A Journal of Hospital Life in the Confederate Army of Tennessee.

Sunday, January 3.—Part of our hospital was destroyed by fire last night. It originated in the officers’ quarters of the Buckner Hospital, through the negligence of a negro servant. I have been told that some of the officers who were wounded nearly lost their lives. We lost two buildings; they had few patients in them, and no one was hurt. But a short time since they were filled with badly wounded, who, fortunately, had been removed.

We had stores and every thing else moved from our rooms. Among them were two barrels of whisky, a box of coffee, the latter just received from Wilmington, and many other valuables. We lost nothing except a quantity of hospital clothing.

Mr. Sparks is injured. He was not near the fire, but became very much alarmed, and is now suffering very much.

We have no fire-engines, and all did their part in arresting the flames. Dr. Hughes is an old gentleman, but worked harder than any one.

A number of parties have been given here lately. Miss W. cried out: “O, if the people would only keep from dancing, we would not have this trouble.” I believe I echoed her sentiments.

Mrs. J. visited the wards with me this afternoon. The men, with the exception of one or two, are doing well.

Mrs. W. always spends Sunday in the wards, and benefits the men much by talking to them.

After we had left Chattanooga, on a visit there, I met one of the nurses who was with us in the Newsom Hospital, and he was very low with typhoid fever. He inquired anxiously after Mrs. W., and said that, since lying on his sick-bed, he had often thought of her, and all he had heard her say to the patients, and wished he had profited more by her counsels. He was removed from Chattanooga to Ringgold. Mrs. W. went to see him, and he told her he had resolved to lead a new life, and that her teaching had been the means of converting him. This is not an isolated case, by any means.

I am often afraid that Mrs. W. will injure herself with work. She never sees a man with ragged clothes but she mends them for him, and many a night 12 o’clock does not find her in bed.

I often think of how much good the ladies of this place could accomplish in this respect. Many a man goes back to the front as ragged as he came from it. I had determined to let this subject drop, but somehow I always get back to it. I can not help losing my temper when I see so many idle women unwilling to do any little thing for these heroes, who have suffered so much.

I hinted to some of the ladies about having tobacco bags made, as the tobacco gets scattered all over the beds, but none offered to make them; some were kind enough to give me the pieces to have them made. After the labors of the day are past, Miss W. and myself make as many as we can.

Previous post:

Next post: