Abbie Howland Woolsey to Georgy and Eliza.Friday, May 16.
We have hundreds of dollars sent to us to spend “for the soldiers.” Mr. Wm. Aspinwall, for one, sent Jane a cheque for $250. Now how shall we lay it out, so as to be most useful? Dr. G. said it made him heartsick, as it would us, to see the destitution and suffering of those men brought in at Yorktown. It makes me heartsick to think of it, and the only comfort is in knowing that if the condition of the men is horrible as it is, what would it be if nothing were done—if there were no Sanitary Commission. Take away all that voluntary effort has done for the army and what light would the government appear in before the world? Shamefully inefficient and neglectful!
Dr. Grymes shook Mother warmly by the hand to-day as we went on board the Daniel Webster, and said, “We can’t do without your children. We fight for them down there, to know whether they shall go up on the boats or stay at Yorktown, but on the whole, they are more useful where they are. Your son, too, is very busy and is indispensable.” I hope you will all three manage soon to be together and have the comfort of each other’s help, and keep each other in check from doing too much. Jane says she has awful dreams about Georgy, that the other night a message came that she was ill with hasty typhoid fever followed by paralysis from over-exertion! There, Georgy, is a catalogue of evils for you.
Uncle Edward is ready to do anything on earth. He sent by the Daniel Webster 75 canton flannel shirts which he thought would be useful for typhoid men brought in from camp. Up here, he says, they are sure to be taken care of after a while. He bought also eighty dollars worth of cotton pocket handkerchiefs, half of which I sent by Mrs. Trotter; etc., etc. He brought here for Jane to dispose of six jugs of very old port wine, each half a gallon, which he had decanted himself. Jane says that shall be distributed under her own eye.
We saw your red flag, I suppose it was, that you spent Sunday in making, flying at the peak of the Daniel Webster. . . . After the hundred canton flannel bed gowns were all made they told us they were too long for sick men and too heavy for fever patients. . . . Mother is extremely anxious to go on one of these trips of the Daniel Webster, and urges my consent! I generally evade the subject, for I think it would be too severe service. Don’t you need stepladders for climbing to upper berths? Have you got them?
We were all assigned to duty by Mr. Olmsted wherever he thought we fitted in best, and his large printed placards put up on the steamers gave orders for the “watches” and hours for “relief,” meals, etc., etc., so that the work went on as in a city hospital.
