The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1861-11-20
Who Will Help the L-dits

Etif0rs Of DispGt9h We have seen in pri in I
the great success oi the government hospitals
at CGipeper Court House. A share of this
success Is due without doubt to DIR. Green
ana MS asslstantsj but the writer hereof
lately and for some months a patient there.
has no hesitation in asserting that another
ana no small share, is due to the ladies who
without recompense, IN n ister to the sutfarin
soldier like sisters Of Charity.
These ladies (and we use the word "ladies''
expressly give not only their time and labor
grhus to the sufferers; bat they give their
own private purses daily to the same cause
The patients there after Il nice meal of some
dellcacy, quite toreign1to governms. entail
commissa!i1t, have often breathed their sa It's
lacton AT having government so paren tai
as TO provide them with such; but have been
both surprised nnd panied, when conyaies.
cent enough to get about and peer behind the
curtain, TO ind that all those delicate extra.
came not from the conmissary but from the
pockets of those noble women who had sure
ly done enough in attending their bedsiies
without thus depicting their own purses.
Had they, In doing thus, have but shared with
the sick soldier, they would have meritei the
gratitude of himself and the country but
when III doing SO they have dleted themselves
upon the coarse fare OF the commissariat, they
deserve ali ihata country and a people iand
history too) III award them.
row, the writer hereof kno,os, of his own
knowledge, that the several LADIES' connected
with the great Smith Hospital, and il.
branches at Culpeper, have, for mon tbs past,
been purchasing delicacies tor the sick and
wounded with their individual funds, while
they, themselves, in that drear Old dining
room OF theirs, nave been piIing on man
BAKERS bread, poor fresh beef, and common
coNee-the Latter, generally, without la iIk
ana very often without even the dirty black
sugar ,Goled ont to the hospitals by a restrict
Ell ccmlniSsary. he has seen butter milk
sweet milk, butter, honey custards pies tarts
preserves, pickles, &c brought in occasion.
ally from the generous farm house matrons
OF the country, and he has messed with the
ladies, 1T the next meal thereafter, in fond
hope OF getting Il share OF these, but has al
ways been disappointed. Experience and OBJ
serVaiion hath taught him, that in the paucity
OF even the best such supply, none but the
bed ridden soldier gets share.
Now 10 yon, gentlemen and ladies of the
cfty and the piantauons-you who are paid
Tor your labors; who risk not your lives
amid disease; who retire 10 lest disrobed,
because you expect not Il dozen wakings dar-
ing the night to traverse an hundred wards OF
open air space, perChance in rain to visit Il
dying man In distant wards; you who have
something better TO eat than such as we have
described, and who have a change of even
such good food 10 you it NAV at first blush
seem strange that these noble women may
want say a dish Of oysters. In Richmond and
the Peninsula oysters are no rarity, but it is
a fact that these ladies at CuIpeper have vet
TO see the first oyster pom their table . Sue
why don t they buy them % you ask We re-
ply that in the first pace they may not be quite
so wealthy as Miss Burdette Coutts; in the
second place, what few bivalves ever reach
that town sell at about seven hundred per
cent. advance upon city prices, and in the
third, what few they can get they give as
treat to some poor patient.
Such being the fact, will not each one who
reads this bring or send TO the clerk desk of
the Dispatch a sum which, i'll the aggregate,
will enable him 10 send these good women a
weekly treat of oysters
The writer is conscious of the certainty that
said ladies will deprecate this appeal when
they see or hear oft; but he braves the stu
alton because they can't guess who he is and
becanse their health demands a change of
food.