Weekly commercial herald. (Vicksburg, Miss.) 1884-18??, 1885-11-27
Tribute to the Womanhood of the
South.
"Nay! tell il as !ou may,
1t never can be told,
And sing it as you will,
1t never can be sung!"

And sing it as you will,
1t never can be slngH'
Edward Everett, speaking of the
Crimean war, asks who carried off the
palm Of that tremendous contest?
Not Emeperors and Kings, Generals,
Admirals. nor Engineers launching
from inpenetrable fortresses and
blazing intrenchments the three-bat-
tied thunders OF war.
Not the heroism of soldiers nor the
peerless achievement Of great chief
tains.
No, but an English girl, cultivated, re-
fined, appearing upon that dread stage
of human action and suffering, in no
higher character than that OF d nurse.
Florence Nightingale's noble dis
play of energetic benevolence, mingled
with all the tenderness of wOman's
love, encircled her brow with the only
enduring wreath of the Crimean war
"a wreath that will be preserved in
perfect bloom when all the laurels Of
the Alma and Inkerman, and ~BalaklaVa,
the Redan and the Malakotf, have
faded.
And yet with this high tribute, l do
not hesitate to assert that there were
thousands of the late war more heroic
and self-sacrifcing, whose names were
never paraded, and many of them
scarcely known; noble, cultivated,
great women, who made sacrifices and
performed duties to which Florence
Nightingale, with all her justly won
laurels were totally unequal.
The womanhood of the South, under
the watchful care, tender training, and
stimulus of the chivalric sentiment
peculiar to the warm generous South
ern heart was delicate and refined.
Yet in times of great and crushing
trials, these women found strength in
self abnegation, deprivation and the
more terrible sacrifices incident to civil
war.
Their patriotism was more enthusi-
astic and their sacrifices greater than
those of the musket bearers who went
bravely to the field whilst the immo-
lations they made upon the glorious
affairs of this southland of their SONS
and husbands were greater to them,
than the fall of Johnston at Shiloh or
Jackson at Charlottesville to the cause.
And it thrills me now, when | review
the past, and remember what | have
seen-these matchless women making
sacrifices, enduring hardships and per-
forming holy duties to which facing
the fiery thunderbolts of the enemy
were hurdly to be compared.
Nothing but their superior moral
worth, and exalted spiritual power
q could have sustained them in these
! trying emergencies.
10 the noble and heroic who have
sickened, been wounded, and died. and
who have had the care and ceaseless
attention of these angels of mercy, in
hospital, at home, in camp, on the ter
rible field of carnage who had receiv-
ed their sympathy, tears and prayers
in their last expiring moments, it were
a benedictiOn Of devotion little less
than the consistency and love OF woman
at the Cross, when The great Pan was
dying and dead.
| have seen these Christian women
subjected to the fiery wrath of inter
necIne strife. | have seen her in
watchful, untagging attention by the
side of the sick and wounded l have
seen her by the hard cot Of the dying
in the wonderful tenderness Of her
sympathy and love. l have known OF
her standing yer the graves OF ouI
fallen performing the last sad rites
"where no soldier discharged his fare.
well shot !" l have seen her as she
stood serenely steadfast and unmur'
muring by the precious affairs, where
lay in glorious state the bodies OF her
brave SONS
Ihave seen her glorihed in her hero
ism {; and immortalized through hel
devotion to cause, duty and to honor
l have seer her in the thraldom Of
intense suspense, when the flashing
thunderbolts Of war shook the very
foundations Of her hope, and she trem
bled IN agony under the blaze OF the
fiery conflict fearful of the grea'
cause, her country, and the fate OF bel
cherished idols!
| have seer her hope rise heaven
ward, above the fury and havoc OF thu
deadly charge and rest there like a staI
of benediction!
l have seer this hope trampled
bleeding, and dying under the chariot
wheels Of the triumphant victor!
have seen her since the final defeat
in the hour Of our humiliation, will
everything reversed, doing the worl
of menials, building up the waste
places, encouraging the tried and per