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Memories - A Record of Personal Experience and Adventure During Four Years of War by Fannie A. Beers
page 42 of 362 (11%)
shirts and drawers. There was no lack of food, both substantial and of
a kind proper for the very sick.

I do not believe that a squad of sick soldiers arrived in Richmond, at
least during the first year of the war, who were not discovered and
bountifully fed shortly after their arrival. In this case waiter after
waiter of food was sent in, first from the house of Mr. Yarborough and
afterward by all the neighborhood. Hospital supplies having been
ordered as soon as it was known the sick men were expected, all
necessaries were soon at hand, while the boxes referred to supplied
many luxuries. The large room into which all these were huddled
presented for days a scene of "confusion worse confounded." The
contents of two of the largest boxes were dumped upon the floor, the
boxes themselves serving, one as a table for the drugs, the other as a
sort of counter where the druggist quickly compounded prescriptions,
which the surgeons as hastily seized and personally administered.
Carpenters were set at work; but of course shelves, etc., could not be
magically produced, so we placed boards across barrels, arranging in
piles the contents of the boxes for ready use.

Mrs. Hopkins, sitting upon a box, directed these matters, while I had
my hands full attending to the poor fellows in the wards where they
had been placed.

Four of our sick died that night. I had never in my life witnessed a
death-scene before, and had to fight hard to keep down the emotion
which would have greatly impaired my usefulness.

At the end of a long, large wing of the factory were two excellent
rooms, formerly the offices of the owners. These were comfortably
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