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Three Weeks at Gettysburg.
New York: Anson D. F. Randolph, 1863. 12mo (5.75” x 4.5”), self wrappers or lacking wrappers. 24 pp. Woolsey’s scarce and moving account of her relief work and nursing at Gettysburg for three weeks subsequent to the conflict, published shortly afterwards. Woolsey traveled from Baltimore to Gettysburg with her mother at the time of the battle. Here they assisted in caring for soldiers of both armies and helped transport the wounded away from the battlefield to hospitals. Woolsey wrote this account in an attempt to inspire other women to increase their efforts in aiding Union soldiers. The pamphlet was originally published privately and was then reprinted—“for a more general circulation among the friends and contributors to the Sanitary Commission, in the belief that it cannot fail to stimulate and encourage them in their work.” Woolsey arrived in Gettysburg believing that her brother, who was serving on Gen. Meade’s staff, was wounded, although this proved untrue. Soon after their arrival, Frederick Law Olmstead—head of the U.S. Sanitary Commission—asked the two women to establish and run a Sanitary Commission camp near the railroad station in Gettysburg. The ladies quickly agreed. Trained as a nurse, Georgeanna was sent to Virginia in time for the first battle of the war and soon became a competent and compassionate nurse who was also adept at overseeing the management of a hectic war hospital. At Gettysburg, she oversaw the pitching of tents, cooking of food, distribution of medicine, and also nursed wounded men. According to her account, nearly every soldier who left Gettysburg stopped for at least a meal at her tents. Georgeanna and her mother served as nurses until the end of the war and visited Richmond shortly after the end of the war. Born in Brooklyn and coming from a pro-Union, abolitionist household, Georgeanna Woolsey (1833–1906) also tended to wounded and set up relief stations at various hospitals and battlefields at Belle Plain and Fredericksburg. After the war, Woolsey and her husband, a doctor she met during the war, established the Connecticut Training School for Nurses at New Haven Hospital in 1873. Additionally, she published Hand Book of Nursing for Family and General Use (1879); co-founded the Connecticut Children’s Aid Society (1892); and with her sister Eliza, wrote the two-volume, Letters of a Family during the War for the Union (1899). WorldCat records just eight copies. REFERENCES: Bierle, Sarah Kay. Georgeanna Woolsey: Battlefield Nurse at gazette665.com; Woolsey, Georgeanna Muirson (1833–1906) at encyclopedia.com CONDITION: Light chipping at spine and margins of covers.
Item #5616
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