While General Butler was digging Dutch Gap in 1863, a hospital boat was plying daily between Fortress Monroe and Point of Rocks. In the Civil War, among the wounded brought in from the battlefield to Point of Rocks was a lad about sixteen or seventeen years of age. One of his arms, and a leg, had been amputated.
Away from home! Crippled for life! Homesick, and no “tear for pity.” Hope gone! No, not all hope. He still has his Mother—“She floats upon the river of his thoughts.”
A Mother is a Mother still
The holiest thing alive.
“Mother, come to me—thine own son slowly dying far away.” “No, you can’t come. May I come to you, my dearest Mother?”
Tired of the hollow, the base, the untrue,
Mother, O Mother, my heart calls for you!
© Harris & Ewing
WARREN G. HARDING
The President, also President American Red Cross Society, March 4, 1921–.
From a letter by the Secretary to President Harding: “The President entertains the highest sentiment regarding the splendid service of Miss Barton and her contribution to the development of practical modern humanitarianism.”
His soldier chum heard his pleadings and interceded: “Miss Barton, can’t we possibly find room for this boy on the boat going down to Fortress Monroe tonight? I think he has grit enough to live.” Miss Barton, turning to the boy said: “My dear boy, you shall go, though they have sent word they can take no more.” The boy was taken down a long steep hill on a stretcher, tenderly placed in a nice comfortable cot way up on the hurricane deck, to dream of home and Mother.