The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1899-03-02

During the civil war there were at
at one time nearly ten thousand
wounoed and sick men in the hospitals
at Fortress Monroe. The hospital SER
vice was Indifferent, and many men
died from lack of proper treatment be-
cause a grateful country had not been
educated in the needs of the sick and
disabled in war
During this period, 1926, Fortress
Monroe could be reached only by steam
boats which left Baltimore or Wash
ington at night and arrived at the fort
in the morning. The thought of send
ing flowers to the sick was not COM
mon. The kindly mission of the flow
ers had not come. Men despised them
as trifling things, and women had only
a crude love for them. Florists did not
thrive even in the large cities.
In these rude hospitals near the
Fortress, The sick and wounded lay
side by side in almost CHASTITY rows;
weak i'm body and depressed in spirit
There came one day into the hospi-
tails little woman, above fifty years
in age, a sweet face, and dressed as a
Quakeress. On her arm was a basket
filled with the freshest flowers, al
though 1t was in the month of Febru-
airy, ana greenhouses were not COM
mon in the country. She held an order
from the commandant allowing her the
freedom of all PAGES. She passed by
the cots selecting with quick intuition
certain patients into whose hands she
placed flowers, spoke gently and moved
on. She disappeared for a few days
and then reappeared with more flowers,
which she placed with discrimination
in the feeble hands of patient men.
For many months she left and return
ed on the Flower Mission. 1t was said
that she nved in Philadelphia, and had
found her son wounded, after he had
kissed the hot lips of the enemy's
guns in the battle field at Manassas.
She had taken him out of the field hos
pital and with her own hands had con-
structeu a tent among the pine trees,
in which she nursed him. He called
for flower in his delirilIm, and she
SdpneF0u some WIiu ONES, Which, she
placed in his hands. He smiled, looked
at her, and his soul then went beyond
the stars" In his name, and in sacred
memory of his last smile, she became
one of the first of the messengers who
carried flowers to the distant hospitals.
Some years after the close of the
war, one, who had been an officer,
and had lain for many weeks in one
of these hospitals, owing to a wound
received in the assault upon Peters
burgh, wrote to the writer of this
sketch: Can you tell me if Mrs. C
is living, and if so, where? l used to lie
in my cot and watch her as she entered
the ward with her flowers. She seemed
to have the step of a fairy, it was sc
light, ano she had the smile of ar
angel She put in my hand one day
a rose when l was sleeping. AS | awok'
its perfume seemed to fill the air.
put me at once in my mothers hous'
on the Susquehanna river. When sh'
came again. She seemed to me to 10
the mother OF Christ walking on earth
Some said she was not rich, but CAV
what she had I have money now. ca
you find her full name and residenc
on any records in the Fortress? l
she is alive, l wish to give her $4,000
/ have no creed, no religion beyon
that which is expressed in her act, tina
divine altruism which relieves the sof
rows of mortals. If she is dead, sh
will still live in me, for | convert Goa
and iron into flowers, and those in sol
row and sickness have them.
A careful inquiry was made. He
residence in the outskirts of Philadel
phia was found with difficulty-onl
a small cottage, but she was not, fo
her soul too had gone beyond tn