LXXXVII
Andersonville[[9]] was not the gateway of hell; it was hell itself.
Clara Barton.
[9]. Without honoring the request of the Secretary of War, Edwin M. Stanton, to take an expedition to Andersonville to mark the graves of the missing soldiers, there could have been no cemetery at Andersonville. The cemetery which the Government now so worthily owns is a gift from our active corps of women.—Clara Barton.
He (President Lincoln) said, “I will help you.” He smoothed the way and made it possible, assisting me until the work was done.
Clara Barton.
Only in the Great Book of Life is it written what Clara Barton did for the homes of this land, after the Civil War was over.
Sarah A. Spencer.
In a Memorial to U. S. Congress, Clara Barton said that in doing this work referred to, as per itemized bill, she reported that she had expended from her private funds as a contribution to the cause $1,759.33, and further said: “My own time and services have been cheerfully given.” The Author.
I remembered our prisons crowded with starving men whom all the powers and pities of the world could not reach with a bit of bread. I thought of the widows’ weeds still fresh and dark through all the land, north and south, from the pine to the palm, the shadows on the hearths and hearts over all my country—sore, broken hearts; ruined, desolate homes. Clara Barton.
DORENCE ATWATER
For the record of your dead you are indebted to the forethought, courage and perseverance of Dorence Atwater, a young man not twenty-one years of age.—(Signed) Clara Barton, in an official report to the people of the United States of America, in 1865.
This memorial will stand as a silent reminder of the untiring and loyal devotion of one whose memory will live while time endures.—Ida S. McBride, Chairman Memorial Committee.
DEDICATION OF MEMORIAL TO CLARA BARTON AT ANDERSONVILLE, GEORGIA, MAY 31, 1915
Erected by the Woman’s Relief Corps Auxiliary to the Grand Army of the Republic.
Left to right: Mrs. Emma E. Grinnell, P. Dept., Pres. Wisc. W. R. C.; William Grinnell, P. Dept., Com. G. A. R., Wisc; Mrs. Ida S. McBride, P. Natl. Pres. W. R. C.; Miss Agnes Hitt, P. Natl. Pres., W. R. C.; Hon. Washington Gardner, P. Com.-in-Chief, G. A. R.; Mrs. Mary A. North, P. Natl. Jun. Vice-Pres., W. R. C.
The path of this work was opened for her through records kept by Dorence Atwater, a Connecticut boy-prisoner at Andersonville, who had been detailed to keep a record for the prison officials of the dead, and their burial. He kept a secret duplicate record, with location of graves. He saw a notice asking for information signed “Clara Barton,” when he at once wrote to her. Together they went to Andersonville and with his aid she succeeded with the identification of 19,920 graves and placing headstones above them, while 400 of these were marked “unknown.”
Manchester (N. H.) Mirror.
Yes, give me the land with a grave in each spot,
And the names in the graves that shall not be forgot;
Yes, give me the land of the wreck and the tomb—
There’s grandeur in graves, there’s glory in gloom;
For out of the gloom future brightness is born,
And after the night looms the sunrise of morn;
And the graves of the dead, with the grass overgrown,
May yet form the footstool of liberty’s throne;
And earth’s single wreck in the war path of night
Shall yet be a rock in the temple of right.
Father Ryan.