Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 3.djvu/1067

972 At the close of the war she returned to Philadelphia, but learning soon that an effort was being made to induce the State of Indiana to provide a home for the soldiers' orphans, she again offered her services in any useful capacity in that work. A benevolent gentleman of Indianapolis who had been most urgent in calling the attention of the officers of the State to their duty in that matter, finding that there was no hope, offered to furnish Miss Fussell with the money necessary to clothe, rear, educate and care for a family of ten orphans of soldiers, and bring them up to maturity, if she would furnish the motherly love, the years of hard labor and self-sacrifice, the sleepless nights and endless patience needed for the work. After a few days of prayerful consideration she accepted, and in the fall of 1865 ten orphans were gathered together in Indianapolis from various parts of the State from among those who had no friends able or willing to care for them. In the spring of 1866 they were removed to the Soldiers' Home near Knightstown, where a small cottage and garden were assigned to their use. In 1875, she placed the older boys in houses where their growing strength could be better utilized, and moved with the girls and younger boys to Spiceland to secure the benefit of better schools. In 1877, all of the ten but one were self-supporting, and have since taken useful and respectable positions in society. The one exception was a little feeble-minded boy, who, with his brother, had been found in the county poor-house; his condition and wants very soon impressed her with the necessity for a State home for feeble-minded children in Indiana, it having been found necessary to send this boy to another State to be educated. He is nowina neighboring State institution, and is almost self-supporting. With her usual energy and directness, she went to work to gather statistics on the subject of "Feeble-minded Children" in this and other States, and to interest others in their welfare. She at last found an active co-worker in Charles Hubbard, the representative from Henry county in the legislature, and their united efforts, aided by other friends of the cause, secured in 1876 the enactment of the law establishing the Home for Feeble-minded Children, now in operation near Knightstown, Indiana.

Having seen all her children well provided for, she began to look for further work, and soon conceived the idea of taking the children from the county poor-houses of the State and forming them into families. She offered to take the children in the Henry county poor-house and provide for them home, food, clothing and education, for the small sum of twenty-five cents per day for each child, which her experience had proven to be the smallest sum that would accomplish the good she desired; but the county commissioners would only allow her twenty cents per day. She accepted their terms, furnishing the deficit from her own means, and so earnest was she and so completely did she demonstrate the superiority of her plan for the care of these children, that she interested many others in the work, and the result was the passage of a law by the legislature of 1880-1881, giving to county commissioners the right to place their destitute children under the care of a matron, giving her sole charge of them and full credit for her work, and providing for her salary and their support. Under that law Miss Fussell now has all the destitute children of Henry county under her care, and has created a model orphans' home. Thus has this one woman been a power for good, and by following in the direct line of her duty, has been obliged to "meddle in the affairs of State" and to influence legislation.

If in giving this sketch we have exceeded the limits allotted us, let us remember that our subject represents thousands of noble women who care rather that their light shall carry with it comfort and warmth, than be noted for its brilliancy, and who, having no voice in the government, are obliged to work out their beneficent ideas with much unnecessary labor.

The friends of woman's equality addressed the following petition to each member of the State legislature:

Being personally acquainted with Mrs., and knowing her to be a woman of refinement and culture, we can consistently urge upon you a favorable con-