The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1898-05-11
WOMAN IN WAR TIMES.
Her Record is a Proud One, and She Still
Upholds It.
The &Mmdav Repwblic.

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So long has been the reign Of peace
in this wide, happy land that those OF
US who are still on the sunny side of
middle age know naught Of the saeri-
fees and deep, deep heartaches that
war brings in it's train, save those that
are now storied.
ssIt was during the war;" began the
woman whose hair was silvery white,
and at this all the girls sitting about
her bent toward her eagerly to listen,
for they knew it was prelude to a
story of times when sorrow and bra
very and romance were all blended to-
gether.
The silver-haired woman was a
young mother during the war. A
husband, gallant and brave, she had
bidden good-by and he rode away and
came not back. Now her ssboy' came
to her, and though her heart beat
faster, and she could hardly keep the
! tears back, she said, eyes, my son, if
your country needs you, CO." And
this is the part-the greatest part,
that woman plays in war times.
There is no national air that can so
stir mans heart and cheer him on to
do or die as can the "Go, and God
bless you,' said by the woman that
the soldier knows loves him best on
earth. In it he recognises the COM
plete putting aside Of self, that only
makes it possible to speak these words
without . faltering voice. And he,
600, must forget self for duty's sake.
The woman with the siivery hair
and soft voice that unmistakably be-
lasged to daughter Of the Southland,
wore . clinging light gown, with q
\ dainty silk lining. There was bit Of
ls,y frill that peeped out from beneath
the skirt of her gown, and altogether
aa air Of refinement that suggested to
one that she had known nothing all
her life but purple and fine linen.
There was not girl in the group that
VIA more attractive, in feminine daint-
iness.
ssMy dears," she said, as she went
on with her story Of ssduring the war,
Eve took our best linen underwear
you know women wore linen nearly al
ways in those days-and cut it into
bsndages, and raveled and scraped the
soft pieces into lint for wounds.
Then we wore the coarsest Of un-
bleached muslin instead, aud our
gowns were homespun-yes, spun at
home; I have made my own cloth, and
then my own frosks. And the aris-
tocratic looking listle hand Of the wo-
man strayed over her silken lap, and
the younger women who looked at it
{ wondered how it could ever have ac-
complished such wonderfully hard
things.
We did not count the parting with
cur jewels and fine clothes anything.
Why, we even felt supremely selfish
with such luxury as carpet on the
floor. When ammunition was short,
we melted our pewter kitchen spoons
and made bullets from them, and we
spent long days and nights in the hos
pitfalls taking care of the wounded and
shedding tears over the dead"
Then the girls in chorus demanded
stories shout hospital nursing, and
the silvery haired woman told them
until she came to one where she was
sent for hurriedly, and, undel escort
and guard, went to wait by narrow
sot one long, dark day, and darker
night, and then she could tell no more,
for this day and night at hospital
nursing had ended in long good-by
and "God keep you, said in a tear
checked voice.
This story, in spirit, If not in letter,
is told by women of the North and
South alike. The self-sacri6ce and
heroism Of the women Of 30 years ago
is now often spoken Of as character
istic that belonged to the women of
the past. We have somehow got to
thinking that women are so differ
ent since "before the war" era, and
that in great crisis the ''new" wo-
man might display splendid amount
Of physical strength, but littlo or none
Of the patience and 'self-forgetfuluess
that made heroines out of the most
commonplace little women during
the war" But the soldiers wife aud
mother and sister and sweetheart is
brave to-day as she was in the years
of battles gone by.
The "new" woman has not written