Page:The part taken by women in American history.djvu/352

Rh siege of Charleston, at Fort Wagner, in front of Petersburg and at the Wilderness. She was also at the hospitals near Richmond and on Morris Island. Neither were her labors over when the war ended. A friend desiring that the world should know her actual connection with the government during this period of strife, as well as throughout her administration as head of the Red Cross, has induced Miss Barton to tell the story in her own inimitable way, and this is what she says:

"When in the four years of this work the military authorities unquestioningly provided me transportation, teams, men and an open way to every field in the service, it had something to do with the government.

"When, at its close, the President, over his own signature, 'A. Lincoln,' informed all the people of the United States that I would, voluntarily, search for the records of eighty thousand missing men, of whom the government nor army had any record, and asked the people to write me, it had something to do with the government."

The editor cannot resist the temptation to insert Mr. Lincoln's letter:

"To the friends of missing prisoners : Miss Clara Barton has kindly offered to search for the missing prisoners of war. Please address her at Annapolis, Md., giving name, regiment and company of any missing prisoner. A. LINCOLN." This brought the heartbroken correspondence of the friends of all missing soldiers to her, and placed on the records of the government the names of twenty thousand men who, otherwise, had no record of death, and to-day their descendants enjoy the proud heritage of an ancestor who died honorably in the service of his country, and not the possible suspicion of his being a deserter.

"When, in the search, I learned the true condition of the