of a mile
from headquarters. It was raining heavily, and the mud was deep; but she
was not the woman to be thwarted in her plans by a hospital surgeon,
without a struggle; so, nothing daunted, she sallied out, having first
had the form of an order drawn up, permitting the employment of
contrabands as nurses, at the Gayoso Hospital. Arrived at headquarters,
she was told that the commanding general, Sherman's successor, was ill
and could not be seen. Suspecting that his alleged illness was only
another name for over-indulgence in strong drink, she insisted that she
must and would see him, and in spite of the objections of his
staff-officers, forced her way to his room, and finding him in bed,
roused him partially, propped him up, put a pen in his hand, and made
him sign the order she had brought. This done, she returned to her
hospital, and the next morning, when the surgeon and medical director
came around to enforce the order of the latter, she quietly handed them
the order of the commanding-general, permitting her to retain her
contrabands.

While in charge of this hospital, she made several journeys to Chicago
and other cities of the Northwest, to procure aid for the suffering
soldiers. The first of these were characteristic of her energy and
resolution. She had found great difficulty in procuring, in the vicinity
of Memphis, the milk, butter, and eggs needed for her hospital. She had
foraged from the secessionists, had traded with them her own clothing
and whatever else she could spare, for these necessaries for her "boys,"
until there was nothing more left to trade. The other hospitals were in
about the same condition. She resolved, therefore, to have a dairy for
the hospitals. Going among the farmers of Central Illinois, she begged
two hundred cows and a thousand hens, and returned in triumph with her
flock of hens and her drove of cows. On reaching Memphis, her cattle and
fowls made such a lowing and cackling, that the secessionists of the
city entered their complaints to the commanding general, who assigned
her an island in the Mississippi, opposite the city, where her dairy and
hennery were comfortably accommodated. It was we believe, while on this
expedition that, at the request of Mrs. Hoge and Mrs. Livermore, the
Associate Managers of the Northwestern Sanitary Commission, she visited
Milwaukie, Wisconsin. The Ladies' Aid Society of that city had
memorialized their Chamber of Commerce to make an appropriation