CONFEDERATES AND FEDERALS ALIKE TREATED
Quite a number of wounded Confederate officers were brought to us. They shared alike with our own men. They were amazed, said C. M. Welles, at the kindness of northerners, particularly at a Massachusetts lady (Clara Barton) devoting herself to them as freely as to her own neighbors. One of them, a captain from Georgia, needed shirt, coat, stockings and something to eat. After being supplied, he said to me, while tears were streaming down his face, “Sir, I find that I have mistaken you; and, if I live to return, I will never fight against such a people any more.”
An Angel of Mercy,—her touch they will miss,
That was felt by the Boys of the Blue and the Gray;
But her name is still fragrant with Service, and this
Will inspire their sons in the Cause of Today.
At Fredericksburg a shell shattered the door of the room in which Miss Barton was attending to wounded men. True to her mission, she did not flinch but continued her duties as usual. She found a group of Confederates with their garments frozen fast in the mud. As the wounded were helpless, Miss Barton got an axe and chopped them loose. She then built a fire in a negro cabin and, while the wounded were warming themselves she dressed their wounds, fed them gruel and otherwise cared for them as if they were her “Brothers in Arms.”
A KNOT OF BLUE AND GRAY
Upon my bosom lies
A knot of blue and gray;