“A woman!” exclaimed the doctor; “why, all the women in Gettysburg could not have effected what you have. No one but a Sister of Charity could have done this. Truly it would have been well if a company of Sisters of Charity had been in the war, for then it might not have continued so long.”
One young man after being baptized requested the Sister to stay with him until he died. He prayed fervently until the last breath, and almost his final words were: “Oh, Lord, bless the Sisters of Charity.” This brought a crowd around him, as his bed was on the floor. The Sister was kneeling by him and continued to pray for him until the last; then she closed his mouth and bandaged his face with a towel, in the usual manner. They who stood near said one to another: “Was this man her relative?”
“No,” was the reply; “but she is a Sister of Charity.”
“Well,” said one of the company, “I have often heard of the Sisters of Charity, and I can now testify that they have been properly named.”
The surgeon remarked to the religious: “Sisters, you must be more punctual at your repast. I see you are often here until 4 o’clock in the afternoon without your dinner, working for others with a two-fold strength. Where it comes from I do not know—forgetting no one but yourselves. You should, however, try to preserve your own health.”
A Protestant gentleman remarked to one of the Sisters that “the Sisters of Charity have done more for religion during the war than has ever been done in this country before.”
Both the Catholic church and the Methodist church in Gettysburg were used for hospital purposes. One day a Sister from the Catholic church had ordered her supplies, as usual, from the sanitary store. Soon after this a Sister who was nursing the sick in the Methodist church called at the store and as she was about to leave the merchant said:
“Where are these articles to be sent? I believe that you belong to the Catholic church.”
“No, sir,” replied the Sister, with a barely suppressed smile. “I belong to the Methodist church. Send the goods there.”
After the more severely wounded had been removed by friends, or had died, the officers began directing the work of transferring the remaining patients from the town hospital to a wood of tents, called the general hospital.