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Summer Vacation: Clara Jones and Her Full-Time Hospital Work

Clara Jones worked aboard the pictured hospital steamer, the State of Maine, in August of 1862. Courtesy of the National Archives

Schoolteacher Clara Jones engaged in full time hospital work in the summer of 1862.

Frederick Law Olmsted’s memoir “Hospital Transports” describes the efforts of the United States Sanitary Commission during the Peninsula Campaign in 1862.

An amputation performed after Gettysburg. (NLM)

The following accounts are a tiny sampling of the battlefield experiences of the wounded on three hellish July days: the Battle of Gettysburg.

“If I know I can be of service in tending the wounded…I’m bound to be on hand.”

Thousands of Confederate refugees fled war zones to the relative safety of the Southern interior.

While removing a rock from his shoe on the picket line outside Petersburg, Virginia, a Confederate bullet tore through Private Peleg Bradford’s knee.

Headquarters of Christian Commission, Germantown, Va Courtesy of the LOC

The outbreak of war triggered an immediate response among Union civilians thinking about how best to supply and support the armies from the home front.