With what swiftness the “Great War Governor of Massachusetts” acted at this time is matter of history. Two days after the President issued a call for troops, three regiments started for Washington. Massachusetts was thus the first State to come to the aid of the Union—the first, alas! to have her sons struck down and slain.
Governor Andrew was glad to avail himself of Dr. Howe’s offer of aid. The latter’s early experiences in Greece made his help and counsel valuable both to the State and to the nation. Gen. Winfield Scott, Commander-in-Chief of the Army, and Governor Andrew requested him, on May 2, 1861, to make a sanitary survey of the Massachusetts troops in the field at and near the national capital. Before the end of the month the Sanitary Commission was created, Dr. Howe being one of the original members appointed by Abraham Lincoln.
Governor Andrew was almost overwhelmed with the manifold cares and duties of his office. Our house was one of the places where he took refuge when he greatly needed rest. He was obliged to give up going to church early in the war because many people followed him there, importuning him with requests of all sorts.
Thus the questions of the Civil War were brought urgently to my mother’s mind in her own home, just as those of the anti-slavery period had been a year or two before.
To quote her Reminiscences again:
“The record of our State during the war was a proud one. The repeated calls for men and for money were always promptly and generously answered. And this promptness was greatly forwarded by the energy and patriotic vigilance of the Governor. I heard much of this at the time, especially from my husband, who was greatly attached to the Governor and who himself took an intense interest in all the operations of the war.... I seemed to live in and along with the war, while it was in progress, and to follow all its ups and downs, its good and ill fortune with these two brave men, Dr. Howe and Governor Andrew. Neither of them for a moment doubted the final result of the struggle, but both they and I were often very sad and much discouraged.”
Governor Andrew was often summoned to Washington. Dr. Howe’s duties as a member of the Sanitary Commission also took him there. Thus it happened that my mother went to the national capital in their company in the late autumn of 1861. Mrs. Andrew, the Governor’s wife, Rev. James Freeman Clarke, and Mr. and Mrs. Edwin P. Whipple were also of the party.
As they drew near Washington they saw ominous signs of the dangers encompassing the city. Mrs. Howe noticed little groups of armed men sitting near a fire—pickets guarding the railroad, her husband told her. For the Confederate Army was not far off, the Army of the Potomac lying like a steel girdle about Washington, to protect it.
This was my mother’s first glimpse of the Union Army which later made such a deep impression upon her mind and heart. I have always fancied, though she does not say so, that some of the vivid images of the “Battle Hymn” were suggested by the scenes of this journey.
I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps;