He had given up mercantile business in Western New York not long before, and had returned to his early home to care for the declining years of his aged parents. And this was the missionary work to which Mrs. Pomeroy found herself appointed. She was welcomed heartily, and found her duties rendered light by appreciation and affection.
Here, as elsewhere, Mrs. Pomeroy made herself actively useful beyond, as well as within, her home. She performed duties of Sabbath School and general religious instruction, that might be called arduous, especially when added to her domestic cares and occupations. These, with other labors, exhausted her strength and a protracted season of illness followed.
From that time, 1850, for five or six years, she continued to suffer, being most of the time very ill, her life often despaired of. During all this season of peculiar trial she never lost her faith and courage, even when her physicians gave no hope of her recovery, being contented to abide by the will of Providence, convinced that if God had any work for her to do He would spare her life. During this time her husband was often absent, being first in the Massachusetts Legislature, and afterwards sent out as Agent by the Northeastern Aid Society to Kansas, which they were desirous to settle as a free State. Into this last duty she insisted with energy that he should enter. During his absence she experienced other afflictions, but her health notwithstanding rallied, and as soon as possible she made preparations to remove to Kansas where Mr. Pomeroy wished to make a home. In the spring of 1857 she finally arrived there, and there she remained until the spring of 1861, when she accompanied her husband to Washington, when he went thither to take his seat in the Senate.
The hardships and the usefulness of her life in Kansas are matters of history, and it is truly surprising to read how one so long an invalid was enabled to perform such protracted and exhausted labors. All who knew her there bear ample and enthusiastic testimony to the usefulness of her life. To the whites she was friend, hostess, counsellor, assistant, in sickness and in health. To the poor and despised blacks, striving to find freedom, she was friend and teacher, even at the time when her near neighborhood to the slave State of Missouri, made the service most dangerous. Then followed the terrible famine year of 1860. During all that time she freely gave her services in the work of providing for the sufferers. Mr. Pomeroy, aided by the knowledge he had acquired in his experience as Agent of Emigration, was able at once to put the machinery in motion for obtaining supplies from the East, and Mrs. Pomeroy transformed her home into an office of distribution, of which she was superintendent and chief clerk. It was a year that taxed far too heavily her already much exhausted strength.
When she accompanied her husband to Washington in the spring, her health failed, cough and hoarseness troubled her, and she was obliged to leave for visits in her native air, and for a stay of some months at Geneva Water Cure.
From the breaking out of the war Mrs. Pomeroy, on all occasions, proved herself desirous of the welfare of our soldiers. The record of her deeds of kindness in their behalf is not as ample as that of some others, for her health forbade the active nursing, and visiting of the sick in hospitals, which is the most showy part of the work. But her contributions of supplies were always large; and she had always a peculiar care and interest in the religious and moral welfare of the volunteers, who, far from the influences of home, and exposed to new and numerous temptations, were, she felt, in more than one sense encircled by peculiar dangers.
Only once did she revisit her Kansas home, and in the autumn of 1862 spent some months there. There was at that time a regiment in camp at Atchison, and she was enabled to do great good to the sick in hospital, not only with supplies, but by her own personal efforts for their physical and spiritual welfare.
On her return to Washington she there entered as actively as possible into this work. Her form became known in the hospitals, and many a suffering man hailed her coming with a new light kindling his dimmed eyes. She brought them comforts and delicacies, and she added her prayers and her precious instructions. She cared both for souls and bodies, and earned the immortal gratitude of those to whom she ministered.
In January, 1863, her last active benevolent work was commenced, namely the foundation of an asylum at the National Capital for the freed orphans and destitute aged colored women whom the war, and the Proclamation of Emancipation, had thrown upon the care of the benevolent. For several months she was actively engaged in this enterprise. A charter was immediately obtained, and when the Association was organized, Mrs. Pomeroy was chosen President.
Almost entirely by her exertions, a building for the Asylum was obtained, as well as some condemned hospital furniture, which was to be sold at auction by the Government, but was instead transferred—a most useful gift—to the Asylum.