“Knickerbocker,” May 30.
Dear Mother, — Yesterday I took Mrs. Reading and two Zouaves to carry the supplies, and spent the day at the camp hospital. There are one hundred tents, each censé to hold twenty-seven persons; but they were not more than half full, many of the first set of men having recovered after a week’s rest and returned to the front, while nearly two hundred of the worst cases went North on the ” Spaulding.” I found the condition of things far better than I expected, and infinitely better than it was a week ago. We visited nearly all the tents, and gave supplies of beef-tea, milk-punch, arrowroot, and eggs for the worst cases, of which there were comparatively few, for such cases are put on the Commission boats. I found four or five men for whom nothing could be done but to help them to die in peace, and perhaps twenty other bad cases. The remainder needed little more than a week or two of rest. The tents were both floored and trenched, the day was cool and bright, everything smelt clean and wholesome. A tent had been pitched for me in the middle of the hollow square of the camp, where I cooked painfully by one small spirit-lamp. We used up everything we took with us, and saw the surgeons, who were very cordial, particularly Dr. Green, of Massachusetts, and a lesser light, Dr. A. A. Stocker, of Cambridge, Mass., who gave me his card, whereby I know his name.
Nearly all the camp needs is some responsible person who could prepare the sick food systematically under the surgeons’ orders. The ordinary diet seemed good and plentiful, and quite suited to the majority of the cases. We started for home at 4 P. M., and found four hundred prisoners just arriving by the railway from General Porter’s command. They were nearly all North Carolinians, —fine-looking men, well fed, and in good spirits. One man wanted to buy one of our tin cups; I laughed, and gave it to him. Another asked Dr. Ware to change a ten-dollar Confederate note, and expected ten of our dollars for it. Dr. Ware said: “If we beat you, what good will those notes be to you?” “Oh!” said he, “the United States Government will take them.” General Van Vliet told me that a great many of these men had asked to take the oath of allegiance.
This has been a busy day. We all — “all” this time means Mr. Olmsted, Mr. Knapp, we four ladies, and Mrs. Reading —started with breakfast for eighty men; a young surgeon having rowed down to us to report that they had arrived in the night and were lying in the cars without food. We found the birds flown, however, — I suppose to the camp hospital. But General Van Vliet and some telegrams from the front met us at the landing; and the result is that we are to clear off, as fast as “we can, all the sick and wounded now on our hands. The “Webster,” fills up to-morrow; the “Daniel Webster No. 2 ” left immediately for Yorktown with four hundred sick on board; the “Elm City” will fill to-night, and sail at daybreak. We ourselves came back at once to the ” Knickerbocker,” from which the sick men have been removed, and we have been all day unpacking and arranging stores, and getting pantries and closets in order. I am writing on the floor, interrupted constantly to join in a laugh. Georgy is sorting socks and pulling out the funny little balls of yarn and the big darning needles stuck in the toes, with which she is making a fringe across my back. Do spare us the darning-needles! Reflect upon us rushing in haste to the linen-closet and plunging our hands into the bale of stockings! I certainly shall make a collection of sanitary clothing. I solemnly aver that yesterday I found a pair of drawers made for a case of amputation at the thigh. And the slippers, —only fit for pontoon-bridges! We are at last in perfect order, and are told that the wounded will arrive about 4 A.M., — such a nice, comfortable hour! There are two hundred and fifty to come down,— mostly from Hanover Court-House, where General Porter had a brilliant success on Friday.
The Sanitary Commission is not treated in the handsomest manner; its benevolence is imposed upon. Squads of civilian doctors are here, waiting about for “surgical cases.” There must be dozens of them doing nothing, and their boats doing nothing, — waiting for a battle. They would not look at a sick man; bless you, he’s not their game! It is “cases” they want; and their whole influence goes to getting off the sick upon the Commission, instead of taking their proper share of the work, so that they may, when a battle occurs, get a harvest of wounded. Now the reason why we complain of this is that Mr. Olmsted is anxious to keep his ships (which are perfectly organized and well-managed) running in a regular manner, so that if a battle occurs, he may be prepared for it. If he is overwhelmed with the sick (who could be easily and regularly transported if all did their share), he is liable to be unprepared for an emergency; and if the Commission is unprepared, I am afraid it will go hard with the poor fellows when the evil day comes.
Since I began this page a furious gust or storm of wind, rain, thunder, and lightning has come up. We are plunging up and down at our anchor on the sweet river as if it were mid-ocean; and in the midst of it the dear “Wilson Small” tumbles up alongside, true to her colliding principles. Alas for the wounded who are on their way to us!
Our evenings are the pleasantest hours of the day. The Chief and Mr. Knapp and the staff collect on a broken chair, a bed-sack, and sundry carpet-bags, and have their modicum of fun and quinine. The person who possesses a dainty — chocolate or gingerbread, for instance— is the hero for the time being.
Good-by! The storm is just going over. Oh, how good it will be to sleep in a bed once more! I found to-day one of the bed-sacks we made in such a hurry last autumn; and in unpacking stores I have several times come across packages labelled in my handwriting. Tell this to the Women’s Aid Society. Tell them also that flannel shirts are never in sufficient quantity; the flannel can be heavier and coarser than what we have hitherto used. Socks are always wanted. Gray and red flannel shirts are precious; we keep them for special cases. If anybody proposes to send me anything, say: Good brandy; gray, white, or red shirts, army pattern; canton flannel drawers, not too large; pocket-handkerchiefs (boxes of spotted ones can be bought cheap in New York), towels, nutmegs, bay-water, coarse flannel in the piece, Muringer’s beef-extract,—this is precious as gold to us; Soyer’s and other soup preparations are comparatively worthless for our purpose. We have plenty of fresh beef for the “house diet,” and we make a good deal of our beef-tea out of it with muriatic acid; but even that takes time. What we want is something available-at a moment’s notice; therefore send Muringer’s beef-extract. It comes in small cakes looking like a dark glue. Send also condensed milk, lemons, and sherry.
If gentlemen ask what they shall send, say MONEY to the treasury of the Sanitary Commission.
