The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1867-07-10
Grand National Entertainment,
For the benefit of the
LADIES SOCIETY
In Aid Of the
Suffering and Destitute Poor of the South,
Will take place
In Washington, D. G., Aug. 1, '67.

The s.Ladies' Society in aid Of the Suffering and
Destitute Poor of the South would respectfully
and earnestly call the attention of the generous
Northern public to the great distress and fearful
suffering now prevailing in the Southern States.
Letters are daily received from the Southi from
the Generals Commanding, Governors, ministers
and eminent citizens, furnishing the most heart
rendine details cf the actual Want, famine and
starvation in their immediate ncighborhood: The
following few extracts from the very many letters
received by the Secretary and Managers of the
Society are respectfully referred to-
H'DouARTERs, 4th MILITARY DIsTiIoT
IMIssIsstpPt AND ARKANSAS
VIcKsBURo: MISS, May 1S, 1867
am glad to sec that the attention of the gentle
and humane ladies Of the North is being turned to-
wards the sad and itsolate condition of this once
happy land.
You Madam, surrounded with the plenty and
comforts of o wealthy city, can scarcely appreti-
atS the fact that in many parts ofthe South, whole
communities are, by failure in crops and the abb
sence of money or its equivalent, left in want of
the necessares of life; and that poor women, with
large families of helpless children, accustomed
to depend on the labor of others, that now, With
no husband, brother Or servant to help and no
money, they do not know what to do or where to
90 for food but are left in the solitudes of these
Southern forests, in rags and gaunt with munger,
SuDSlStlng on Wnat tne lnOLncr OF idFBer cuiuIeH
can shoot or pick up in the woods, or on what the
few neighbors nearly as poor as they ere can bring
them.
Officers of my acquaintance have met with such
mothers; long after dark, out in the woods, with
m old gun just fired, and the coon or ptssum just
killed have gone home with them and met the
group of little starvclings waiting patiently moth
ers return With some of the only sort Of food they
he'd tasted for weeks; and women and children
have been found within sixty miles Of the capital
of e Southern State, during the past year, who
had starved to death in their lonesome cabins.
These cases of great distress rare in Southern
Cities for there, the most delicately bred can
generally End some work shich they can do to
keep the wolf from the door; but the farms or
plantations in the South are peculiarly secluded,
With miles Of forest or swamp between them, poor
roads, and the stock and animals nearly oil taken
by the war, the famine, the foods, the thieves,
who in such times infest country, and the dis
tressed families are often, by the time necessity
makes them want to leave, too sick to travel on
foot, and there is no other way to 60.
Your proposed entertainment, Madam, should it
produce only funds enough to relieve q small frac-
ton of the destitution of this country, will be
good beginning and may be followed in other
cities North by similar appeals to people who have
happily never felt the dcsolntion and the horrors
which follow in the tracks of greht armies of nva-
sion. God speed your society in the good work, is
the wish of, Madam, yours truly,