Chapter XV: Part II (5)

During the next two years her active spirit chafed in forced idleness, and life became almost a burden. In the autumn of 1853, going to Charlestown and Cambridge to visit friends, she met the physician who had attended her during the severe illness that terminated her teacher-life. He examined her lungs, and gave it as his opinion that only a removal to a warmer climate could preserve her life through another winter, and that the following months of frost and cold spent in the North must undoubtedly in her case develop pulmonary consumption.

To her these were words of doom. Not possessed of the means for travelling, and unable, as she supposed, to obtain a livelihood in a far off country, she returned to Maine, and resigned herself with what calmness she might, to the fate in store for her.

But Providence had not yet developed the great work to which she was appointed, and though sorely tried, and buffeted, she was not to be permitted to leave this mortal scene until the objects of her life were fulfilled. Through resignation to death she was, perhaps, best prepared to live, and even in that season when earth seemed receding from her view, the wise purposes of the Ruler of all in her behalf were being worked out in what seemed to be an accidental manner.

In the family of her cousin, Mr. Baxter, at Charlestown, Massachusetts, there had been living, for two years, three Spanish boys from Costa Rica, Central America. Mr. Baxter was an instructor of youth and they were his pupils. About this period their father arrived to fetch home a daughter who was at school in New York, and to inquire what progress these boys were making in their studies. He applied to Mr. Baxter to recommend some lady who would be willing to go to Costa Rica for two or three years to instruct his daughters in the English language. Mr. Baxter at once recommended Miss Bradley as a suitable person and as willing and desirous to undertake the journey. The situation was offered and accepted, and in November, 1853, she set sail for Costa Rica.

After remaining a short time with the Spanish family, she accepted a proposition from the American Consul, and accompanied his family to San Jose, the Capital, among the mountains, some seventy miles from Punta Arenas, where she opened a school receiving as pupils, English, Spanish, German, and American children. This was the first English school established in Central America. For three months she taught from a blackboard, and at the end of that time received from New York, books, maps, and all the needful apparatus for a permanent school.

This school she taught with success for three years. At the end of that time learning that the health of her father, then eighty-three years of age, was rapidly declining, and that he was unwilling to die without seeing her, she disposed of the property and "good-will" of her school, and as soon as possible bade adieu to Costa Rica. She reached home on the 1st of June, 1857, after an absence of nearly four years. Her father, however, survived for several months.

Her health which had greatly improved during her stay in the salubrious climate of San Jose, where the temperature ranges at about 70 deg. Fahrenheit the entire year, again yielded before the frosty rigors of a winter in the Pine Tree State, and for a long time she was forced to lead a very secluded life. She devoted herself to reading, to the study of the French and German languages, and to teaching the Spanish, of which she had become mistress during her residence in Costa Rica.

In the spring of 1861, she went to East Cambridge, where she obtained the situation of translator for the New England Glass Company, translating commercial letters from English to Spanish, or from Spanish to English as occasion required.

This she would undoubtedly have found a pleasant and profitable occupation, but the boom of the first gun fired at Sumter upon the old flag stirred to a strange restlessness the spirit of the granddaughter of one who starved to death on board the British Prison Ship Jersey, during the revolution. She felt the earnest desire, but saw not the way to personal action, until the first disastrous battle of Bull Run prompted her to immediate effort.

She wrote to Dr. G. S. Palmer, Surgeon of the Fifth Regiment Maine Volunteers, an old and valued friend, to offer her services in caring for the sick and wounded. His reply was quaint and characteristic. "There is no law at this end of the route, to prevent your coming; but the law of humanity requires your immediate presence."

As soon as possible she started for the seat of war, and on the 1st of September, 1861, commenced her services as nurse in the hospital of the Fifth Maine Regiment.

The regiment had been enlisted to a great extent from the vicinity of Gardiner, Maine, where, as we have said, she had taught for several years, and among the soldiers both sick and well were a number of her old pupils.

The morning after her arrival, Dr. Palmer called at her tent, and invited her to accompany him through the hospital tents. There were four of these, filled with fever cases, the result of exposure and hardship at and after the battle of Bull Run.

In the second tent, were a number of patients delirious from the fever, whom the surgeon proposed to send to Alexandria, to the General Hospital. To one of these she spoke kindly, asking if he would like to have anything; with a wild look, and evidently impressed with the idea that he was about to be ordered on a long journey, he replied, "I would like to see my mother and sisters before I go home." Miss Bradley was much affected by his earnestness, and seeing that his recovery was improbable, begged Dr. Palmer to let her care for him for his mother and sisters' sake, until he went to his last home. He consented, and she soon installed herself as nurse of most of the fever cases, several of them her old pupils. From morning till night she was constantly employed in ministering to these poor fellows, and her skill in nursing was often of more service to them than medicine.

Colonel Oliver O. Howard, the present Major-General and Commissioner of the Freedmen's Bureau, had been up to the end of September, 1861, in command of the Fifth Maine Regiment, but at that time was promoted to the command of a brigade; and Dr. Palmer was advanced to the post of brigade surgeon, while Dr. Brickett succeeded to the surgeoncy of the Fifth Regiment.

By dint of energy, tact and management, Miss Bradley had brought the hospital into fine condition, having received cots from friends in Maine, and supplies of delicacies and hospital clothing from the Sanitary Commission. General Slocum, the new brigade commander, early in October made his first round of inspection of the regimental hospitals of the brigade. He found Dr. Brickett's far better arranged and supplied than any of the others, and inquired why it was so. Dr. Brickett answered that they had a Maine woman who understood the care of the sick, to take charge of the hospital, and that she had drawn supplies from the Sanitary Commission. General Slocum declared that he could have no partiality in his brigade, and proposed to take two large buildings, the Powell House and the Octagon House, as hospitals, and instal Miss Bradley as lady superintendent of the Brigade Hospital. This was done forthwith, and with further aid from the Sanitary Commission, as the Medical Bureau had not yet made any arrangement for brigade hospitals, Miss Bradley assisted by the zealous detailed nurses from the brigade soon gave these two houses a decided "home" appearance. The two buildings would accommodate about seventy-five patients, and were soon filled. Miss Bradley took a personal interest in each case, as if they were her own brothers, and by dint of skilful nursing raised many of them from the grasp of death.

A journal which she kept of her most serious cases, illustrates very forcibly her deep interest and regard for all "her dear boys" as she called them. She would not give them up, even when the surgeon pronounced their cases hopeless, and though she could not always save them from death, she undoubtedly prolonged life in many instances by her assiduous nursing.

On the 10th of March, 1862, Centreville, Virginia, having been evacuated by the rebels, the brigade to which Miss Bradley was attached were ordered to occupy it, and five days later the Brigade Hospital was broken up and the patients distributed, part to Alexandria, and part to Fairfax Seminary General Hospital. In the early part of April Miss Bradley moved with the division to Warrenton Junction, and after a week's stay in and about Manassas the order came to return to Alexandria and embark for Yorktown. Returning to Washington, she now offered her services to the Sanitary Commission, and on the 4th of May was summoned by a telegraphic despatch from Mr. F. L. Olmstead, the energetic and efficient Secretary of the Commission, to come at once to Yorktown. On the 6th of May she reached Fortress Monroe, and on the 7th was assigned to the Ocean Queen as lady superintendent. We shall give some account of her labors here when we come to speak of the Hospital Transport service. Suffice it to say, in this place that her services which were very arduous, were continued either on the hospital ships or on the shore until the Army of the Potomac left the Peninsula for Acquia Creek and Alexandria, and that in several instances her kindness to wounded rebel officers and soldiers, led them to abandon the rebel service and become hearty, loyal Union men. She accompanied the flag of truce boat three times, when the Union wounded were exchanged, and witnessed some painful scenes, though the rebel authorities had not then begun to treat our prisoners with such cruelty as they did later in the war. Early in August she accompanied the sick and wounded men on the steamers from Harrison's Landing to Philadelphia, where they were distributed among the hospitals. During all this period of hospital transport service, she had had the assistance of that noble, faithful, worker Miss Annie Etheridge, the "Gentle Annie" of the Third Michigan regiment, of whom we shall have more to say in another place. For a few days, after the transfer of the troops to the vicinity of Washington, Miss Bradley remained unoccupied, and endeavored by rest and quiet to recover her health, which had been much impaired by her severe labors.

A place was, however, in preparation for her, which, while it would bring her less constantly in contact with the fearful wounds and terrible sufferings of the soldiers in the field, would require more administrative ability and higher business qualities than she had yet been called to exercise.

The Sanitary Commission in their desire to do what they could for the soldier, had planned the establishment of a Home at Washington, where the private soldier could go and remain for a few days while awaiting orders, without being the prey of the unprincipled villains who neglected no opportunity of fleecing every man connected with the army, whom they could entice into their dens; where those who were recovering from serious illness or wounds could receive the care and attention they needed; where their clothing often travel-stained and burdened with the "Sacred Soil of Virginia," could be exchanged for new, and the old washed, cleansed and repaired. It was desirable that this Home should be invested with a "home" aspect; that books, newspapers and music should be provided, as well as wholesome and attractive food, and that the presence of woman and her kindly and gentle ministrations, should exert what influence they might to recall vividly to the soldier the _home_ he had left in a distant state, and to quicken its power of influencing him to higher and purer conduct, and more earnest valor, to preserve the institutions which had made that home what it was.

Rev. F. N. Knapp, the Assistant Secretary of the Commission, on whom devolved the duty of establishing this Home, had had opportunity of observing Miss Bradley's executive ability in the Hospital Transport Service, as well as in the management of a brigade hospital, and he selected her at once, to take charge of the Home, arrange all its details, and act as its Matron. She accepted the post, and performed its duties admirably, accommodating at times a hundred and twenty at once, and by her neatness, good order and cheerful tact, dispensing happiness among those who, poor fellows, had hitherto found little to cheer them.

But her active and energetic nature was not satisfied with her work at the Soldiers' Home. Her leisure hours, (and with her prompt business habits, she secured some of these every day), were consecrated to visiting the numerous hospitals in and around Washington, and if she found the surgeons or assistant surgeons negligent and inattentive, they were promptly reported to the medical director. The condition of the hospitals in the city was, however, much better than that of the hospitals and convalescent camps over the river, in Virginia. A visit which she made to one of these, significantly named by the soldiers, "Camp Misery," in September, 1862, revealed to her, wretchedness, suffering and neglect, such as she had not before witnessed; and she promptly secured from the Sanitary Commission such supplies as were needed, and in her frequent visits there for the next three months, distributed them with her own hands, while she encouraged and promoted such changes in the management and arrangements of the camp as greatly improved its condition.

This "Camp Misery" was the original Camp of Distribution, to which were sent, 1st, men discharged from all the hospitals about Washington, as well as the regimental, brigade, division and post hospitals, as convalescent, or as unfit for duty, preparatory to their final discharge from the army; 2d, stragglers and deserters, recaptured and collected here preparatory to being forwarded to their regiments; 3d, new recruits awaiting orders to join regiments in the field. Numerous attempts had been made to improve the condition of this camp, but owing to the small number and inefficiency of the officers detailed to the command, it had constantly grown worse. The convalescents, numbering nine or ten thousand, were lodged, in the depth of a very severe winter, in wedge and Sibley tents, without floors, with no fires, or means of making any, amid deep mud or frozen clods, and were very poorly supplied with clothing, and many of them without blankets. Under such circumstances, it was not to be expected that their health could improve. The stragglers and deserters and the new recruits were even worse off than the convalescents. The assistant surgeon and his acting assistants, up to the last of October, 1862, were too inexperienced to be competent for their duties.

In December, 1862, orders were issued by the Government for the construction of a new Rendezvous of Distribution, at a point near Fort Barnard, Virginia, on the Loudon and Hampshire Railroad, the erection of new and more comfortable barracks, and the removal of the men from the old camp to it. The barracks for the convalescents were fifty in number and intended for the accommodation of one hundred men each, and they were completed in February, 1863, and the new regulations and the appointment of new and efficient officers, greatly improved the condition of the Rendezvous.

In December, 1862, while the men were yet in Camp Misery, Miss Bradley was sent there as the Special Relief Agent of the Sanitary Commission, and took up her quarters there. As we have said the condition of the men was deplorable. She arrived on the 17th of December, and after setting up her tents, and arranging her little hospital, cook-room, store-room, wash-room, bath-room, and office, so as to be able to serve the men most effectually, she passed round with the officers, as the men were drawn up in line for inspection, and supplied seventy-five men with woollen shirts, giving only to the _very_ needy. In her hospital tents she soon had forty patients, all of them men who had been discharged from the hospitals as well; these were washed, supplied with clean clothing, warmed, fed and nursed. Others had discharge papers awaiting them, but were too feeble to stand in the cold and wet till their turn came. She obtained them for them, and sent the poor invalids to the Soldiers' Home in Washington, _en route_ for their own homes. From May 1st to December 31st, 1863, she conveyed more than two thousand discharged soldiers from the Rendezvous of Distribution to the Commission's Lodges at Washington; most of them men suffering from incurable disease, and who but for her kind ministrations must most of them have perished in the attempt to reach their homes. In four months after she commenced her work she had had in her little hospital one hundred and thirty patients, of whom fifteen died. For these patients as well as for other invalids who were unable to write she wrote letters to their friends, and to the friends of the dead she sent full accounts of the last hours of their lost ones. The discharged men, and many of those who were on record unjustly as deserters, through some informality in their papers, often found great difficulty in obtaining their pay, and sometimes could not ascertain satisfactorily how much was due them, in consequence of errors on the part of the regimental or company officers. Miss Bradley was indefatigable in her efforts to secure the correction of these papers, and the prompt payment of the amounts due to these poor men, many of whom, but for her exertion, would have suffered on their arrival at their distant homes. Between May 1st and December 31st, 1863, she procured the reinstatement of one hundred and fifty soldiers who had been dropped from their muster rolls unjustly as deserters, and secured their arrears of pay to them, amounting in all to nearly eight thousand dollars.

On the 8th of February, 1864, the convalescents were, by general orders from the War Department, removed to the general hospitals in and about Washington, and the name changed from Camp Distribution to Rendezvous of Distribution, and only stragglers and deserters, and the recruits awaiting orders, or other men fit for duty were to be allowed there. For nearly two months Miss Bradley was confined to her quarters by severe illness. On her recovery she pushed forward an enterprise on which she had set her heart, of establishing a weekly paper at the Rendezvous, to be called "The Soldiers' Journal," which should be a medium of contributions from all the more intelligent soldiers in the camp, and the profits from which (if any accrued), should be devoted to the relief of the children of deceased soldiers. On the 17th of February the first number of "The Soldiers' Journal" appeared, a quarto sheet of eight pages; it was conducted with considerable ability and was continued till the breaking up of the Rendezvous and hospital, August 22, 1865, just a year and a half. The profits of the paper were twenty-one hundred and fifty-five dollars and seventy-five cents, beside the value of the printing-press and materials, which amount was held for the benefit of orphans of soldiers who had been connected with the camp, and was increased by contributions from other sources. Miss Bradley, though the proprietor, was not for any considerable period the avowed editor of the paper, Mr. R. A. Cassidy, and subsequently Mr. Thomas V. Cooper, acting in that capacity, but she was a large contributor to its columns, and her poetical contributions which appeared in almost every number, indicated deep emotional sensibilities, and considerable poetic talent. Aside from its interesting reading matter, the Journal gave instructions to the soldiers in relation to the procurement of the pay and clothing to which they were entitled; the requisites demanded by the government for the granting of furloughs; and the method of procuring prompt settlement of their accounts with the government without the interference of claim agents. During the greater part of 1864, and in 1865, until the hospital was closed, Miss Bradley, in addition to her other duties, was Superintendent of Special Diet to the Augur General Hospital, and received and forwarded from the soldiers to their friends, about forty-nine hundred and twenty-five dollars.

The officers and soldiers of the Rendezvous of Distribution were not forgetful of the unwearied labors of Miss Bradley for their benefit. On the 22d of February, 1864, she was presented with an elegant gold watch and chain, the gift of the officers and private soldiers of Camp Convalescent, then just broken up. The gift was accompanied with a very appropriate address from the chaplain of the camp, Rev. William J. Potter. She succeeded in winning the regard and esteem of all with whom she was associated. When, in August, 1865, she retired from the service of The Sanitary Commission, its secretary, John S. Blatchford, Esq., addressed her in a letter expressive of the high sense the Commission entertained of her labors, and the great good she had accomplished, and the Treasurer of the Commission forwarded her a check as for salary for so much of the year 1865 as was passed, to enable her to take the rest and relaxation from continuous labor which she so greatly needed. In person Miss Bradley is small, erect, and possesses an interesting and attractive face, thoughtful, and giving evidence in the lines of the mouth and chin, of executive ability, energy and perseverance. Her manners are easy, graceful and winning, and she evinces in a marked degree the possession of that not easily described talent, of which our record furnishes numerous examples, which the Autocrat of the Breakfast Table calls "faculty."

MRS. ARABELLA G. BARLOW.

A romantic interest encircles the career of this brilliant and estimable lady, which is saddened by her early doom, and the grief of her young husband bereaved before Peace had brought him that quiet domestic felicity for which he doubtless longed.

Arabella Griffith was born in Somerville, New Jersey, but was brought up and educated under the care of Miss Eliza Wallace of Burlington, New Jersey, who was a relative upon her father's side. As she grew up she developed remarkable powers. Those who knew her well, both as relatives and in the social circle, speak of her warm heart, her untiring energy, her brilliant conversational powers, and the beauty and delicacy of thought which marked her contributions to the press. By all who knew her she was regarded as a remarkable woman.

That she was an ardent patriot, in more than words, who can doubt? She sealed her devotion to her country's cause by the sublimest sacrifices of which woman is capable--sacrifices in which she never faltered even in the presence of death itself.

Arabella Griffith was a young and lovely woman, the brilliant centre of a large and admiring circle. Francis C. Barlow was a rising young lawyer with a noble future opening before him. These two were about to unite their destinies in the marriage relation.

Into the midst of their joyful anticipations, came the echoes of the first shot fired by rebellion. The country sprang to arms. These ardent souls were not behind their fellow-countrymen and countrywomen in their willingness to act and to suffer for the land and the Government they loved.

On the 19th of April, 1861, Mr. Barlow enlisted as a private in the Twelfth Regiment New York Militia. On the 20th of April they were married, and on the 21st Mr. Barlow left with his regiment for Washington.

In the course of a week Mrs. Barlow followed her husband, and remained with him at Washington, and at Harper's Ferry, where the Twelfth was presently ordered to join General Patterson's command, until its return home, August 1st, 1861.

In November, 1861, Mr. Barlow re-entered the service, as Lieutenant-Colonel of the Sixty-first New York Volunteers, and Mrs. Barlow spent the winter with him in camp near Alexandria, Virginia. She shrank from no hardship which it was his lot to encounter, and was with him, to help, to sustain, and to cheer him, whenever it was practicable for her to be so, and neglected no opportunity of doing good to others which presented itself.

Colonel Barlow made the Peninsular Campaign in the spring and summer of 1862 under McClellan. After the disastrous retreat from before Richmond, Mrs. Barlow joined the Sanitary Commission, and reached Harrison's Landing on the 2d of July, 1862.

Exhausted, wounded, sick and dying men were arriving there by scores of thousands--the remnants of a great army, broken by a series of terrible battles, disheartened and well-nigh demoralized. Many of the best and noblest of our American women were there in attendance, ready to do their utmost amidst all the hideous sights, and fearful sufferings of the hospitals, for these sick, and maimed, and wounded men. Mrs. Barlow remained, doing an untold amount of work, and good proportionate, until the army left in the latter part of August.

Soon after, with short space for rest, she rejoined her husband in the field during the campaign in Maryland, but was obliged to go north upon business, and was detained and unable to return until the day following the battle of Antietam.

She found her husband badly wounded, and of course her first efforts were for him. She nursed him tenderly and unremittingly, giving such assistance as was possible in her rare leisure to the other wounded. We cannot doubt that even then she was very useful, and with her accustomed energy and activity, made these spare moments of great avail.

General Barlow was unfit for further service until the following spring. His wife remained in attendance upon him through the winter of 1862-3, and in the spring accompanied him to the field, and made the campaign with him from Falmouth to Gettysburg.

At this battle her husband was again severely wounded. He was within the enemy's lines, and it was only by great effort and exposure that she was able to have him removed within our own. She remained here, taking care of him, and of the other wounded, during the dreadful days that followed, during which the sufferings of the wounded from the intense heat, and the scarcity of medical and other supplies were almost incredible, and altogether indescribable. It was after this battle that the efficient aid, and the generous supplies afforded by the Sanitary Commission and its agents, were so conspicuous, and the results of this beneficent organization in the saving of life and suffering perhaps more distinctly seen than on any other occasion. Mrs. Barlow, aside from her own special and absorbing interest in her husband's case, found time to demonstrate that she had imbibed its true spirit.

Again, through a long slow period of convalescence she watched beside her husband, but the spring of 1864 found her in the field prepared for the exigencies of Grant's successful campaign of that year.

At times she was with General Barlow in the trenches before Petersburg, but on the eve of the fearful battles of the Wilderness, and the others which followed in such awfully bewildering succession, she was to be found at the place these foreshadowed events told that she was most needed. At Belle Plain, at Fredericksburg, and at White House, she was to be found as ever actively working for the sick and wounded. A friend and fellow-laborer describes her work as peculiar, and fitting admirably into the more exclusive hospital work of the majority of the women who had devoted themselves to the care of the soldiers. Her great activity and inexhaustible energy showed themselves in a sort of roving work, in seizing upon and gathering up such things as her quick eye saw were needed. "We called her 'the Raider,'" says this friend, who was also a warm admirer. "At Fredericksburg she had in some way gained possession of a wretched-looking pony, and a small cart or farmer's wagon, with which she was continually on the move, driving about town or country in search of such provisions or other articles as were needed for the sick and wounded. The surgeon in charge had on one occasion assigned her the task of preparing a building, which had been taken for a hospital, for a large number of wounded who were expected almost immediately. I went with my daughter to the building. It was empty, containing not the slightest furniture or preparation for the sufferers, save a large number of bed-sacks, without straw or other material to fill them.

"On requisition a quantity of straw was obtained, but not nearly enough for the expected need, and we were standing in a kind of mute despair, considering if it were indeed possible to secure any comfort for the poor fellows expected, when Mrs. Barlow came in. 'I'll find some more straw,' was her cheerful reply, and in another moment she was urging her tired beast toward another part of the town where she remembered having seen a bale of the desired article earlier in the day. Half an hour afterward the straw had been confiscated, loaded upon the little wagon by willing hands, and brought to the hospital. She then helped to fill and arrange the sacks, and afterwards drove about the town in search of articles, which, by the time the ambulances brought in their freight of misery and pain, had served to furnish the place with some means of alleviation."

Through all these awful days she labored on unceasingly. Her health became somewhat impaired, but she paid no heed to the warning. Her thoughts were not for herself, her cares not for her own sufferings. Earlier attention to her own condition might perhaps, have arrested the threatening symptoms, but she was destined to wear the crown of martyrdom, and lay down the beautiful life upon which so many hopes clung, her last sacrifice upon the altar of her country. The extracts which we append describe better the closing scenes of her life than we can. The first is taken from the _Sanitary Commission Bulletin_, of August 15, 1864, and we copy also the beautiful tribute to the memory of the departed contributed by Dr. Francis Lieber, of Columbia College, to the _New York Evening Post_. The briefer extract is from a letter which appeared in the columns of the _New York Herald_ of July 31st, 1864.

"Died at Washington, July 27, 1864, Mrs. Arabella Griffith Barlow, wife of Brigadier-General Francis C. Barlow, of fever contracted while in attendance upon the hospitals of the Army of the Potomac at the front.

"With the commencement of the present campaign she became attached to the Sanitary Commission, and entered upon her sphere of active work during the pressing necessity for willing hands and earnest hearts, at Fredericksburg. The zeal, the activity, the ardent loyalty and the scornful indignation for everything disloyal she then displayed, can never be forgotten by those whose fortune it was to be with her on that occasion. Ever watchful of the necessities of that trying time, her mind, fruitful in resources, was always busy in devising means to alleviate the discomforts of the wounded, attendant upon so vast a campaign within the enemy's country, and her hand was always ready to carry out the devices of her mind.

"Many a fractured limb rested upon a mattress improvised from materials sought out and brought together from no one knew where but the earnest sympathizing woman who is now no more.

"At Fredericksburg she labored with all her heart and mind. The sound of battle in which her husband was engaged, floating back from Chancellorsville, stimulated her to constant exertions. She faltered not an instant. Remaining till all the wounded had been removed from Fredericksburg, she left with the last hospital transport for Port Royal, where she again aided in the care of the wounded, as they were brought in at that point. From thence she went to White House, on one of the steamers then in the service of the Commission, and immediately going to the front, labored there in the hospitals, after the battle of Cold Harbor. From White House she passed to City Point, and arrived before the battles in front of Petersburg. Going directly to the front, she labored there with the same energy and devotion she had shown at Fredericksburg and White House.

"Of strong constitution, she felt capable of enduring all things for the cause she loved; but long-continued toil, anxiety and privation prepared her system for the approach of fever, which eventually seized upon her.

"Yielding to the solicitation of friends she immediately returned to Washington, where, after a serious illness of several weeks, she, when apparently convalescing, relapsed, and fell another martyr to a love of country."

Dr. Lieber says: "Mrs. Barlow, (Arabella Griffith before she married), was a highly cultivated lady, full of life, spirit, activity and charity.

"General Barlow entered as private one of our New York volunteer regiments at the beginning of the war. The evening before he left New York for Washington with his regiment, they were married in the Episcopal Church in Lafayette Place. Barlow rose, and as Lieutenant-Colonel, made the Peninsular campaign under General McClellan. He was twice severely wounded, the last time at Antietam. Since then we have always read his name most honorably mentioned, whenever Major-General Hancock's Corps was spoken of. Mrs. Barlow in the meantime entered the Sanitary service. In the Peninsular campaign she was one of those ladies who worked hard and nobly, close to the battle-field, as close indeed as they were permitted to do. When her husband was wounded she attended, of course, upon him. In the present campaign of General Grant she has been at Belle Plain, White House, and everywhere where our good Sanitary Commission has comforted the dying and rescued the many wounded from the grave, which they would otherwise have found. The last time I heard of her she was at White House, and now I am informed that she died of typhus fever in Washington. No doubt she contracted the malignant disease in performing her hallowed and self-imposed duty in the field.

"Her friends will mourn at the removal from this life of so noble a being. All of us are the poorer for her loss; but our history has been enriched by her death. Let it always be remembered as one of those details which, like single pearls, make up the precious string of history, and which a patriot rejoices to contemplate and to transmit like inherited jewels to the rising generations. Let us remember as American men and women, that here we behold a young advocate, highly honored for his talents by all who knew him. He joins the citizen army of his country as a private, rises to command, is wounded again and again, and found again and again at the head of his regiment or division, in the fight where decision centres. And here is his bride--accomplished, of the fairest features, beloved and sought for in society--who divests herself of the garments of fashion, and becomes the assiduous nurse in the hospital and on the field, shrinking from no sickening sight, and fearing no typhus--that dreadful enemy, which in war follows the wings of the angel of death, like the fever-bearing currents of air--until she, too, is laid on the couch of the camp, and bidden to rest from her weary work, and to let herself be led by the angel of death to the angel of life. God bless her memory to our women, our men, our country.

"There are many glories of a righteous war. It is glorious to fight or fall, to bleed or to conquer, for so great and good a cause as ours; it is glorious to go to the field in order to help and to heal, to fan the fevered soldier and to comfort the bleeding brother, and thus helping, may be to die with him the death for our country. Both these glories have been vouchsafed to the bridal pair."

The _Herald_ correspondent, writing from Petersburg, July 31, says:

"General Miles is temporarily in command of the First Division during the absence of General Barlow, who has gone home for a few days for the purpose of burying his wife. The serious loss which the gallant young general and an extensive circle of friends in social life have sustained by the death of Mrs. Barlow, is largely shared by the soldiers of this army. She smoothed the dying pillow of many patriotic soldiers before she received the summons to follow them herself; and many a surviving hero who has languished in army hospitals will tenderly cherish the memory of her saintly ministrations when they were writhing with the pain of wounds received in battle or lost in the delirium of consuming fevers."

To these we add also the cordial testimony of Dr. W. H. Reed, one of her associates, at City Point, in his recently published "Hospital Life in the Army of the Potomac:"

"Of our own more immediate party, Mrs. General Barlow was the only one who died. Her exhausting work at Fredericksburg, where the largest powers of administration were displayed, left but a small measure of vitality with which to encounter the severe exposures of the poisoned swamps of the Pamunky, and the malarious districts of City Point. Here, in the open field, she toiled with Mr. Marshall and Miss Gilson, under the scorching sun, with no shelter from the pouring rains, with no thought but for those who were suffering and dying all around her. On the battle-field of Petersburg, hardly out of range of the enemy, and at night witnessing the blazing lines of fire from right to left, among the wounded, with her sympathies and powers of both mind and body strained to the last degree, neither conscious that she was working beyond her strength, nor realizing the extreme exhaustion of her system, she fainted at her work, and found, only when it was too late, that the raging fever was wasting her life away. It was strength of will which sustained her in this intense activity, when her poor, tired body was trying to assert its own right to repose. Yet to the last, her sparkling wit, her brilliant intellect, her unfailing good humor, lighted up our moments of rest and recreation. So many memories of her beautiful constancy and self-sacrifice, of her bright and genial companionship, of her rich and glowing sympathies, of her warm and loving nature, come back to me, that I feel how inadequate would be any tribute I could pay to her worth."

MRS. NELLIE MARIA TAYLOR.

The Southwest bore rank weeds of secession and treason, spreading poison and devastation over that portion of our fair national heritage. But from the same soil, amidst the ruin and desolation which followed the breaking out of the rebellion, there sprang up growths of loyalty and patriotism, which by flowering and fruitage, redeemed the land from the curse that had fallen upon it.

Among the women of the Southwest have occurred instances of the most devoted loyalty, the most self-sacrificing patriotism. They have suffered deeply and worked nobly, and their efforts alone have been sufficient to show that no part of our fair land was irrecoverably doomed to fall beneath the ban of a government opposed to freedom, truth, and progress.

Prominent among these noble women, is Mrs. Nellie Maria Taylor, of New Orleans, whose sufferings claim our warmest sympathy, and whose work our highest admiration and gratitude.

Mrs. Taylor, whose maiden name was Dewey, was born in Watertown, Jefferson county, New York, in the year 1821, of New England parentage. At an early age she removed with her parents to the West, where, as she says of herself, she "grew up among the Indians," and perhaps, by her free life, gained something of the firmness of health and strength of character and purpose, which have brought her triumphantly through the trials and labors of the past four years.

She married early, and about the year 1847 removed with her husband, Dr. Taylor, and her two children, to New Orleans, where she has since resided. Consequently she was there through the entire secession movement, during which, by her firm and unswerving loyalty, she contrived to render herself somewhat obnoxious to those surrounding her, of opposite sentiments.

Mrs. Taylor watched anxiously the progress of the movements which preceded the outbreak, and fearlessly, though not obtrusively, expressed her own adverse opinions. At this time her eldest son was nineteen years of age, a noble and promising youth. He was importuned by his friends and associates to join some one of the many companies then forming, but as he was about to graduate in the high school, he and his family made that an objection. As soon as he graduated a lieutenancy was offered him in one of the companies, but deferring an answer, he left immediately for a college in the interior. Two months after the college closed its doors, and the students, urged by the faculty, almost _en-masse_ entered the army. Mrs. Taylor, to remove her son, sent him at once to the north, and rejoiced in the belief that he was safe.

Immediately after this her persecutions commenced. Her husband had been ill for more than two years, while she supported her family by teaching, being principal of one of the city public schools. One day she was called from his bed-side to an interview with one of the Board of Directors of the schools.

By him she was accused (?) of being a Unionist, and informed that it was believed that she had sent her son away "to keep him from fighting for his country." Knowing the gentleman to be a northern man, she answered freely, saying that the country of herself and son was the whole country, and for _it_ she was willing he should shed his last drop of blood, but not to divide and mutilate it, would she consent that he should ever endanger himself.

The consequence of this freedom of speech was her dismissal from her situation on the following day. With her husband ill unto death, her house mortgaged, her means of livelihood taken away, she could only look upon the future with dark forebodings which nothing but her faith in God and the justice of her cause could subdue.

A short time after a mob assembled to tear down her house. She stepped out to remonstrate with them against pulling down the house over the head of a dying man. The answer was, "Madam, we give you five minutes to decide whether you are for the South or the North. If at the end of that time you declare yourself for the South, your house shall remain; if for the North, it must come down."

Her answer was memorable.

"Sir, I will say to you and your crowd, and to the _world_ if you choose to summon it--I am, always have been, and ever shall be, for the _Union_. Tear my house down if you choose!"

Awed perhaps by her firmness, and unshrinking devotion, the spokesman of the mob looked at her steadily for a moment, then turning to the crowd muttered something, and they followed him away, leaving her unmolested. This man was a renegade Boston Yankee.

Such was her love for the national flag that during all this period of persecution, previous to General Butler's taking possession of the city she never slept without the banner of the free above her head, although her house was searched no less than seven times by a mob of chivalrous gentlemen, varying in number from two or three score to three hundred, led by a judge who deemed it not beneath his dignity to preside over a court of justice by day, and to search the premises of a defenseless woman by night, in the hope of finding the Union flag, in order to have an excuse for ejecting her from the city, because she was well known to entertain sentiments inimical to the interests of secession.

Before the South ran mad with treason, Mrs. Taylor and the wife of this judge were intimate friends, and their intimacy had not entirely ceased so late as the early months of 1862. It was late in February of that year that Mrs. Taylor was visiting at the judge's house, and during her visit the judge's son, a young man of twenty, taunted her with various epithets, such as a "Lincoln Emissary," "a traitor to her country," "a friend of Lincoln's hirelings," etc. She listened quietly, and then as quietly remarked that "he evidently belonged to that very numerous class of young men in the South who evinced their courage by applying abusive epithets to women and defenseless persons, but showed a due regard to their own safety, by running away--as at Donelson--whenever they were likely to come into contact with "Lincoln's hirelings.""

The same evening, at a late hour, while Mrs. Taylor was standing by the bed-side of her invalid husband, preparing some medicine for him, she heard the report of a rifle and felt the wind of a minie bullet as it passed close to her head and lodged in the wall. In the morning she dug the ball out of the wall and took it over to the judge's house which was opposite to her own. When the young man came in Mrs. Taylor handed it to him, and asked if he knew what it was. He turned pale, but soon recovered his composure sufficiently to reply that "it looked like a rifle-ball." "Oh, no," said Mrs. Taylor, "you mistake! It is a piece of Southern chivalry fired at a defenseless woman, in the middle of the night, by the son of a judge, whose courage should entitle him to a commission in the Confederate army."

Still, brave as she was, she could not avoid some feeling, if not of trepidation, at least of anxiety, at being thus exposed to midnight assassination, while her life was so necessary to her helpless family.

These are but a few instances out of many, of the trials she had to endure. Her son hearing of them, through the indiscretion of a school-friend, hastened home, determined to enlist in the Confederate army to save his parents from further molestation. He enlisted for ninety days, hoping thus to shield his family from persecution, but the Conscription Act, which shortly after went into effect, kept him in the position for which his opinions so unfitted him. From the spring of 1862, he remained in the Confederate army, gaining rapid promotion, and distinguished for his bravery, until the close of the war, when he returned home unchanged in sentiment, and unharmed by shot or shell--in this last particular more fortunate than thousands of others forced by conscription into the ranks, and sacrificing their lives for a cause with which they had no sympathy.

From the time of her son's enlistment Mrs. Taylor was nearly free from molestation, and devoted herself to the care of her family, until the occupation of New Orleans by the Union forces. She was then reinstated in her position as teacher, and after the establishment of Union hospitals, she spent all her leisure moments in ministering to the wants of the sick and wounded.

In 1863, we hear of her as employing all her summer vacation, as well as her entire leisure-time when in school, in visiting the hospitals, attending the sick and wounded soldiers, and preparing for them such delicacies and changes of food and other comforts as she could procure from her own purse, and by the aid of others. From that time forward until the close of the war, or until the hospitals were closed by order of the Government, she continued this work, expending her whole salary upon these suffering men, and never omitting anything by which she might minister to their comfort.

Thousands of soldiers can bear testimony to her unwearied labors; it is not wanting, and will be her best reward. One of these writers says, "I do assure you it affords me the greatest pleasure to be able to add my testimony for that good, that noble that _blessed_ woman, Mrs. Taylor. I was wounded at Port Hudson in May, 1863, and lay in the Barracks General Hospital at New Orleans for over three months, when I had an excellent opportunity to see and know her work. * * * She worked _every_ day in the hospital--all her school salary she spent for the soldiers--night after night she toiled, and long after others were at rest she was busy for the suffering." And another makes it a matter of personal thankfulness that he should have been applied to for information in regard to this "blessed woman," and repeats his thanks "for himself and hundreds of others," that her services are to be recorded in this book.

Having great facility in the use of her pen, Mrs. Taylor made herself especially useful in writing letters for the soldiers. During the year from January 1864 to January 1865, she wrote no less than eleven hundred and seventy-four letters for these men, and even now, since the close of the war, her labors in that direction do not end. She is in constant communication with friends of soldiers in all parts of the country, collecting for them every item of personal information in her power, after spending hours in searching hospital records, and all other available sources for obtaining the desired knowledge.

During the summer of 1864, her duties were more arduous than at any other time. She distributed several thousands of dollars worth of goods, for the Cincinnati Branch of the United States Sanitary Commission, and on the 1st of June, when her vacation commenced, she undertook the management of the Dietetic Department in the University Hospital, the largest in New Orleans. From that time till October 1st, she, with her daughter and four other ladies, devoted like herself to the work, with their own hands, with the assistance of one servant only, cooked, prepared, and administered all the extra diet to the patients, numbering frequently five or six hundred on diet, at one time.

Two of these ladies were constantly at the hospital, Mrs. Taylor frequently four days in the week, and when not there, in other hospitals, not allowing herself _one_ day at home during the whole vacation. When obliged to return to her school, her daughter, Miss Alice Taylor, took her place, and with the other ladies continued, Mrs. Taylor giving her assistance on Saturday and Sunday, till January 1st, 1865, when the hospital was finally closed.

Mrs. Taylor has been greatly aided by her children; her daughter, as nobly patriotic as herself, in the beginning of the war refusing to present a Confederate flag to a company unless beneath an arch ornamented, and with music the same as on occasion of presenting a banner to a political club the preceding year--_viz_: the arch decorated with United States flags, and the national airs played. Her son "Johnnie" is as well known and as beloved by the soldiers as his mother, and well nigh sacrificed his noble little life to his unwearied efforts in their behalf.

It is out of the fiery furnace of trial that such nobly devoted persons as Mrs. Taylor and her family come forth to their mission of beneficence. Persecuted, compelled to make the most terrible and trying sacrifices, in dread and danger continually, the work of the loyal women of the South stands pre-eminent, among the labors of the noble daughters of America. And of these, Mrs. Taylor and her associates, and of Union women throughout the South, it may well and truly be said, in the words of Holy Writ: Many daughters have done virtuously, but thou excellest them all.

MRS. ADALINE TYLER.

Mrs. Tyler, the subject of the following sketch, is a native of Massachusetts, and for many years was a resident of Boston, in which city from her social position and her piety and benevolence she was widely known. She is a devout member of the Protestant Episcopal Church, greatly trusted and respected both by clergy and laity.

In 1856, she removed from Boston to Baltimore, Maryland. It was the desire of Bishop Whittingham of that Diocese to institute there a Protestant Sisterhood, or Order of Deaconesses, similar to those already existing in Germany, England, and perhaps other parts of Europe. Mrs. Tyler, then a widow, was invited to assume the superintendence of this order--a band of noble and devout women who turning resolutely from the world and its allurements and pleasures, desired to devote their lives and talents to works of charity and mercy.

To care for the sick, to relieve all want and suffering so far as lay in their power, to administer spiritual comfort, to give of their own substance, and to be the almoners of those pious souls whose duties lay in other directions, and whose time necessarily absorbed in other cares, did not allow the same self-devotion--this was the mission which they undertook, and for years prosecuted with untiring energy, and undoubted success.