Terrible loss of life at the battle of Pittsburg Landing or Shiloh. Sister Anthony wins enduring laurels. Seven hundred wounded soldiers crowded on one boat. The deck of the vessel resembles a slaughter house. A Sister of Charity acts as assistant surgeon. Sisters refuse to abandon their patients. Sketch of the life of Sister Anthony.
SISTER ANTHONY.
The battle of Shiloh, Tenn, sometimes known as the battle of Pittsburg Landing, was one of the great combats of the war. Shiloh cost the union army in killed, wounded and prisoners 14,000 men, while the Confederates lost 10,700 men, including General Albert Sidney Johnston, who fell in the first day’s fight. The battles were fought on the 6th and 7th of April, 1862. The morning of the 6th was clear and beautiful, with no indications of a storm; but the day’s terrific battle was followed by a night of drenching rain. The battle of the next day was also succeeded by a fearful storm, which in this case consisted of rain, hail and sleet. An eye-witness writing of this says: “And to add to the horrors of the scene, the elements of Heaven marshaled their forces—a fitting accompaniment 72 to the tempest of human devastation and passion that was raging. A cold, drizzling rain commenced about nightfall and soon came harder and faster, then turned to pitiless, blinding hail. This storm raged with unrelenting violence for three hours. I passed long wagon trains filled with wounded and dying soldiers without even a blanket to shield them from the driving sleet and hail which fell in stones as large as partridge eggs until it lay on the ground two inches deep.”6
It was by the work that she did at and after this battle that Sister Anthony, a notable member of the Sisters of Charity, won enduring laurels. She left Cincinnati for Shiloh, accompanied by two other Sisters of Charity, Dr. Blackman, of Cincinnati; Mrs. Hatch and daughter, Miss McHugh, Mrs. O’Shaughnessy and some charitable ladies of the Queen City. This trip was made on Captain Ross’ boat, under the care of Dr. Blackman. Sister Anthony, whose mind is unimpaired and whose memory is excellent, thus tells of her experience at Shiloh:
“At Shiloh we ministered to the men on board what were popularly known as the floating hospitals. We were often obliged to move farther up the river, being unable to bear the terrific stench from the bodies of the dead on the battlefield. This was bad enough, but what we endured on the field of battle while gathering up the wounded is simply beyond description. At one time there were 700 of the poor soldiers crowded in one boat. Many were sent to our hospital in Cincinnati. Others were so far restored to health as to return to the scene of war. Many died good, holy deaths. Although everything seemed dark 73 and gloomy, some amusing incidents occurred. Some days after the battle of Shiloh the young surgeons went off on a kind of lark, and Dr. Blackman took me as assistant in surgical operations, and I must acknowledge I was much pleased to be able to assist in alleviating the sufferings of these noble men.
“The soldiers were remarkably kind to one another. They went around the battlefield giving what assistance they could, placing the wounded in comfortable places, administering cordials, etc., until such time as the nurses could attend to the wounded and sick. I remember one poor soldier whose nose had been shot off, who had almost bled to death and would have been missed had we not discovered him in a pen, where some kind comrade had placed him before he left the field, every other place of refuge being occupied. His removal from the pen caused great pain, loss of blood, etc. The blood ran down his shirt and coat sleeves, down his pantaloons and into his very boots. He was very patient in the boat up the river. On arriving in Cincinnati he was placed in a ward in our hospital. Shortly after his arrival in the city a gentleman came to Cincinnati and called at the Burnett House, which was then used as a military hospital, inquiring for his son. After searching everywhere else he called at St. John’s Hospital. I met this sorrowing father just as I was leaving the hospital to attend to some business. From the description he gave I concluded that the boy without the nose must be his son. I took him to the ward. When we reached the bed where the man lay the father did not know him.
“‘Well,’ said he, ‘if he is my child I shall know him 74 by his head.’ Running his fingers through the boy’s hair he exclaimed: ‘My son! my dear boy!’
“There was one young man under the care of Sister De Sales. This Sister spoke to him of heaven, of God and of his soul. Of God he knew nothing, of heaven he never heard, and he was absolutely ignorant of a Supreme Being. He became much interested in what the Sister said and was anxious to know something more of this good God of whom the Sister spoke. This good Sister of Charity instructed him, and, no priest being near, she baptized him and soon his soul took its flight to that God whom he so late learned to know and love.
“Were I to enumerate all the good done, conversions made, souls saved, columns would not suffice. Often have I gazed at Sister De Sales, as she bent over the cots of those poor boys, ministering to their every want, in the stillness of the night. Ah! here is one to whom she gives a cool drink, here another whose amputated and aching limbs need attention, there an old man dying, into whose ears she whispers the request to repeat those beautiful words: ‘Lord, have mercy on my soul!’ I asked myself: ‘Do angels marvel at this work?’
“Day often dawned on us only to renew the work of the preceding day, without a moment’s rest. Often the decks of the vessels resembled a slaughter house, filled as they were with the dead and dying.”
The following is what an eye-witness says of Sister Anthony: “Amid this sea of blood she performed the most revolting duties for those poor soldiers. Let us follow her as she gropes her way among the wounded, dead and dying. She seemed to me like a ministering angel, and many a young soldier owes his life to her care and charity. Let us gaze at her again as she stands attentive kindness and 75 assists Dr. Blackman while the surgeon is amputating limbs and consigning them to a watery grave, or as she picks her steps in the blood of these brave boys, administering cordial or dressing wounds.”
A Sister relates a sad story of a young man who was shot in the neck. The wound was very deep. From the effect of this and the scorching rays of the sun he suffered a burning thirst. He was too weak to move, when suddenly the rain fell down in torrents. Holding out his weak hands, he caught a few drops, which sustained life until he was found among the dead and dying on the battlefield. Cordials were given which relieved him. His looks of gratitude were reward enough. Many other soldiers who were thought to be dying eventually recovered.
After the Sisters had finished their work at Shiloh they followed the army to Corinth, where the Confederates had retreated. The river was blocked by obstacles in the stream and progress by boat was necessarily slow. Finally the impediments became so thick that the boat was stopped altogether. The vessel was crowded and the situation was a critical one. The captain finally said that it was a matter of life and death and that the Sisters would have to flee for their lives. To do this it would have been necessary to abandon their patients, who were enduring the greatest misery on the boat. This the Sisters heroically refused to do. All expressed their willingness to remain with the “wounded boys” until the end and to share their fate, whatever it might be. Such heroism melted the hearts of hardened men. The Sisters fell on their knees and called on the “Star of the Sea” to intercede for them, that the bark might be guarded from all harm. And their prayer was answered. 76 Two brave pilots came, who steered the boat to their destination and to a place of safety.
After the war Dr. Blackman became an active member of the medical staff of the Good Samaritan Hospital in Cincinnati and ever proved a sincere friend of Sister Anthony. The Sisters unite in praising the services of Mrs. Hatch and her daughter. Miss Hatch was a most estimable lady, who bestowed upon the soldiers the greatest of charity and kindness. Many of them called her “Sister Jennie,” a rare compliment for one who was not a religious.
The groans of the soldiers on the battlefield of Shiloh still linger in the memories of many of the Sisters. Sister Anthony and her colleagues frequently picked their way through the files of the dead and wounded, and on many occasions assisted in carrying the sufferers to the boats. These floating hospitals were unique in many ways, but they will ever remain memorable as the scenes of the Sisters’ greatest triumphs, where they did so much for the cause of humanity and where so many unwarranted prejudices were removed from the minds of brave men.
Among the war Sisters none was regarded with more affection and reverence than this same Sister Anthony, who spent her last years near Cincinnati, surrounded with all the loving attentions and comforts that should go with honorable old age. Her work for humanity was spread over a long series of years, and the heroic labors she performed during the war form but an episode in a busy and useful career. But it was a brilliant episode, one that deserves to be handed down to history and that brought fadeless laurels to a modest and unpretending woman.
SISTER ANTHONY.
Sister Anthony O’Connell was born in Limerick, 77 Ireland, of pious Catholic parents. She came with them to this country at an early age, and, in pursuance of a long-cherished idea, renounced the world and was vested with the familiar habit of the Sisters of Charity. Her novitiate and earlier years in the order were spent at Emmittsburg, Md. Finally she was placed in charge of a community at Cincinnati. According to good people in that city who carefully watched her career, she displayed unusual devotion, business talent and self-sacrifice. Through her exertions an orphan asylum was founded at Cumminsville, where large numbers of friendless and homeless children were cared for and reared to a sense of their responsibility to God and man.
When the Civil war broke out Governor David Tod issued a call for volunteer nurses. Alive to the necessities of the occasion, Sister Anthony relinquished the care of her asylum to other hands and, taking a band of Sisters with her, offered their services. Their work was in the South, most of it being in and around Nashville, Shiloh, Richmond, Ky.; New Creek and Cumberland. Colonel John S. Billings, M. D., now of the Surgeon General’s office at Washington, is one of the physicians having personal knowledge of Sister Anthony, and he speaks of her in the very highest terms. “I first knew Sister Anthony,” he said to the writer, “in 1859, when she was in charge of the old St. John’s Hospital, on Fourth street, Cincinnati, in which I was resident physician, and I have known her ever since. I can say very cordially that she was a competent hospital manager and that I have always had the greatest respect and affection for her.”7. 78
Sister Anthony and her brave assistants spent many months in Nashville. The care and attention that was bestowed upon the sick and wounded soldiers of both the union and Confederate armies did much to dispel the thoughtless prejudices that had previously existed against the Sisters. They went about like good angels, easing many a troubled spirit and showering love upon all with whom they came in contact. Sister Anthony stood out in bold relief from all the others, and one who has knowledge of those times says: “Happy was the soldier who, wounded and bleeding, had her near him to whisper words of consolation and courage. Her person was reverenced by Blue and Gray, Protestant and Catholic alike, and the love for her became so strong that the title of the ‘Florence Nightingale’ of America was conferred upon her, and soon her name became a household word in every section of the North and South.” Many of the Sisters with whom she worked fell upon the field of honor, but Sister Anthony lived and survived to enjoy a peaceful old age and the sweet thought and consolation of work well done.
The ending of the war, however, did not end her work. After the white wings of peace had been spread over the battlefields she returned to Cincinnati and made an effort to ............