ne PART III. MASSACHUSETTS AT HOME. CHAPTER I. PATRIOTIC PHILANTHROPY AND CHARITIES. The American The Spontaneous and Practical Sympathy of the People. Lowell takes the Lead.- A NCIENT history records the offering, by the Carthaginian women, of their hair, to manufacture bowstrings for their warriors; and modern annals relate the story of Revolutionary sacrifices, and of a Florence Nightingale's ministry of mercy, whose shadow the suffering and grateful soldier kissed: but the late civil war presented the world with a spectacle of organized and individual benevolence, comprehending the temporal and spiritual wants of a million of men, altogether new in the history of war. The civil conflict had immediately concerned in its issues a territory not only unequalled in extent, but covered with a network of railways for travel, above which ran telegraphic wires connecting city and hamlet. The enterprising city of Lowell claims to have been the first, not only in the field with her troops, but at home, in a formal subscription in behalf of the soldiers, the first to form an aid society, and the first to hold a sanitary fair. - A public meeting was held April 15, 1861; and, on the 18th, Judge Crosby wrote a note to the mayor, enclosing a check for one hundred dollars, requesting that the sum be sent immediately to the paymaster of the regiment, to supply any wants for which, in the haste of departure, no provision had been made. He also suggested the formation of a society to meet the necessities for which rations and medicine-chests did not provide. The mayor laid the matter before the City Council that evening, and took up a subscription as suggested. Five hundred dollars, besides Judge Crosby's one hundred, were thus obtained. Some of these men, she "What can we do to aid As early as the 15th of April, while the ladies of Bridgeport, Conn., were holding a meeting in behalf of the army, for which the President's call had reached them a few hours before, Miss Almena B. Bates, of Charlestown, was reading the summons to the volunteers to prepare for the field. knew, would go from Charlestown. them in the sacrifices and sufferings before them?" was the question that stirred her heart and fell from her lips. There was a quick response to the benevolent appeal; and, on the memorable 19th of April, a number of ladies and gentlemen signed a paper, which set forth in outline the organization of a relief society. Three days later, the Bunker-hill Relief Society adopted a constitution, and appointed officers: Mrs. H. G. Hutchins being chosen president; Mrs. H. Lyon, secretary; and Miss Almena B. Bates, treasurer. More than ten thousand dollars were received by this society in money; and at one meeting, July 9, 1862, three hundred articles of clothing were made for the army. Two hundred soldiers' families were also relieved at home. Boston had no truer friend of the soldier than her son and Mayor, during nearly the whole war, the Hon. F. W. Lincoln, jun. He was born in that city, Feb. 27, 1817, the descendant of Puritan stock. His early life was marked by industry and probity,qualities that have adorned his manhood. In all public movements for the prosecution of the war and the welfare of the troops, he was prompt to act, often drawing generously from his private means. His letter to the Mayor of Savannah, which went with the cargo of provisions after the surrender of that city, "was a model of touching Christian sympathy and patriotic sentiment." April 18, there was a meeting of the officers of the Boston banks, and an offer made of their funds to the State, through the Gov ernor. Thirty-nine banks were represented, comprising a capital of thirty-five million dollars. The Boston Board of Trade passed a series of patriotic resolutions the same day. The Common Council also appropriated a hundred thousand dollars for military purposes in the city. April 20, Fletcher Webster issued a card proposing to raise a new regiment; and, on the 22d, there was a meeting in the Mer PUBLIC PHILANTHROPY AND CHARITIES. 569 chants' Exchange to raise money to equip it, which, in three days, reached twelve thousand five hundred dollars. April 22, Plymouth, the Old Colony, raised two thousand dollars for the war; Marblehead, five thousand; Quincy, ten thousand; Abington, five thousand; Malden, one thousand; Weymouth, five thousand; Jamaica Plain, four thousand; Cambridge, ten thousand; Waltham, sixty-seven hundred; Pawtucket, three thousand; Brookline, fifteen thousand; Newton, twenty-four hundred twenty-five; and Lynn, ten thousand. Andrew Carney gave five hundred to Irish volunteers; and the Barnstable Bank, Yarmouth, voted to loan the State thirty-three thousand. The aldermen of Boston passed resolutions unanimously pledging the moral and material support of the city. During the succeeding days, railroad companies, beginning with the Eastern, insurance companies, with their plan to send a large steamer to cruise in the Gulf of Mexico, and other organizations, offered their aid. The boys of the Quincy School gave two hundred dollars for such former members of the institution as might enlist. Framingham raised three thousand dollars to fit out a volunteer company, and her bank offered to loan the State twenty-five thousand dollars. Among the women who tendered their services, the young ladies of Mr. Sledhoff's school voted to devote their week's vacation to the making of garments for the soldiers. Somerville, Roxbury, Dorchester, Mansfield, Middleton, Woburn, Dedham, Melrose, Marshfield (where repose the remains of Webster), the Island of Nantucket, Sutton, Georgetown, Fairhaven, and, indeed, nearly every town, followed in the enthusiastic offer of sums in proportion to their wealth equal to those already tendered. Even the inmates of the State Prison, at Charlestown, caught the spirit of sacrifice, and cheerfully performed extra labor in the common cause. Nurses responded to the call of Miss D. T. Dix, authorized by Secretary Cameron to act in the military hospitals. The last of April, Mrs. Harrison Gray Otis, a name fragrant with Revolutionary memories, originated the Donation Committee. She determined to open her house as a depot for receiving and distributing the necessaries and comforts of a soldier's life; when Mr. Evans offered the spacious rooms of the Evans House, Tremont Street, for her use. She entered them, and, with the cooperation of the Misses L. and D. Brown and Miss Bates, com menced her noble work, relying upon the Bank of Faith for means to prosecute it. About ten thousand dollars in money, hundreds of thousands of substantial articles of clothing and food, and an abundant supply of Testaments and other religious works, were distributed. The Soldiers' Relief Fund, 56 State Street, the Home of Discharged Soldiers, the Massachusetts Bible Society, and the ladies at the M'Lean Asylum, Somerville, were valuable auxiliaries to the Evans House. The Ladies' Industrial Aid Association, whose object it was to furnish work for wives of soldiers, employed many hundreds of grateful women. Mrs. C. R. Lowell was the president of this excellent association. Boston City Aid was another fountain of this exhaustless benevolence: its monthly outlay was nearly twenty thousand dol lars. April 30, the teachers of the public schools of Boston voluntarily proposed to relinquish from ten to twenty-five per cent of their salaries during the continuance of the national troubles. The superintendent of schools, and masters of Latin, English, High, and Girls' High and Normal Schools, twenty-five per cent. Masters of Grammar Schools, and sub-masters of English and Latin High Schools, fifteen per cent. Sub-masters and ushers of Latin and English High Schools, twelve and a half per cent. Ushers of Grammar Schools, ten per cent. The annual sum paid by this cheerful sacrifice alone, into the treasury of the State's war-charities, was twelve thousand dollars. The city of Boston cut down its appropriation one-quarter of a million, as a matter of economy, in view of the condition of the country. A committee of one hundred was appointed at a citizens' meeting to take charge of and distribute funds collected and received for the benefit of soldiers, Gov. Andrew, President; Chief Justice George T. Bigelow, Vice-President; and Ex-Govs. Levi Lincoln, Edward Everett, Marcus Morton, George N. Briggs, George S. Boutwell, Emory Washburn, John H. Clifford, Henry J. Gardner, and Nathaniel P. Banks, as Executive Committee. Then came a succession of contributions from towns, corporations, and individuals, for the outfit of companies, the presentation of horses to officers, and of banners to be borne through the smoke of battle. PUBLIC PHILANTHROPY AND CHARITIES. 571 Ex-Gov. Washburn, of the Cambridge Law School, sent flannel -shirts and pocket-handkerchiefs by the hundred, which were made by the ladies of that town. In acknowledging their cheerful labors, he said, "In glancing over the names, I realized most completely how great a hold the cause, in relief of which these troops are mustered, has upon every social class in our community. There are no hands too delicate to contribute something to the work," alluding to a letter from a poor needle-woman who was anxious to do the little in her power. May 23, 1861, the State Legislature passed "An Act in Aid of the Families of Volunteers, and for other Purposes; " doubtless the earliest legislation in the charitable department of service for the country in the war. Party and denominational lines disappeared before the strong tide of patriotic benevolence flowing from the people. The Sixth and Seventh Regiments from Massachusetts were met in New York by members of the Young Men's Christian Association with fraternal interest,-the beginning of army-work in that organization. The similar independent, local labor devoted to the troops in and near Washington, which Mr. Alvord found when he reached the front, attracted the attention of the leading minds of these useful associations. Delegates were sent out to visit the camps. and barracks; and by personal conversation, prayer, and religious books, they endeavored to promote the moral and spiritual welfare of the men. In the encampments at home, there was also much done by individual effort. Consultations respecting the best method to enlarge operations were held, which resulted in calling delegates from the Young Men's Christian Associations of the country, in New York, Nov. 16, 1861. A United-States Christian Commission was formed, whose first President was Rev. A. Rollin Neale, D.D., of Boston. This grand enterprise, combining both material and moral relief and comfort to the army, soon attracted to it the Christian sentiment and sympathy of the North, and the grateful regard of the troops. Among its successful appeals to New England were eight meetings called by the Boston Army Committees in that city, and twenty-eight others in different parts of the six States; whose golden harvest the first year was the handsome sum of seven thousand five hundred dollars. Seven hundred packages of stores were forwarded to the front. |