of easing their condition and encouraging them to new efforts in defense of our glorious cause. You will please confer with Mrs. von Wackerbarth, corner Seventh and Elm streets, in regard to the steps to be taken in this matter.
The commanding officers at Cairo, Paducah, or vicinity, are hereby requested to grant any facilities consistent with the public interests that may be desired by the bearers of this note. They are Mrs. Couzins and Crawshaw, of the Ladies' Union Aid Society, who wish to administer relief to our sick and wounded. By order of
My Dear Mrs. Couzins: The surgeon-general has notified me that he may want me to send nurses and surgeons to Columbus and Corinth. I look to you, my dear madam, as one ever ready to volunteer when you can be of real service. In case it should become necessary, may I rely on your valuable services? Such other names as you may suggest I would be pleased to have.
Jas. E. Yeatman.
| Office Of Western Sanitary Commission, | |
| Saint Louis, Mo., Oct. 8th, 1862. |
Mrs. Couzins has been detailed to service in the hospital steamer T. L. McGill, as volunteer nurse.
N. B.—If the place of service is changed, a new certificate will be issued.
James E. Yeatman,President of Sanitary Commission.
Pass Mrs. Couzins from Corinth to Columbus.
| Headquarters Dep't of the Tennessee | |
| Before Vicksburg, Feb'y 21st, 1863. |
The quartermaster in charge of transportation at Memphis, Tenn., will furnish transportation on any chartered steamer plying between Memphis, Tenn., and St. Louis, to Mrs. Couzins and five other ladies, members of the Western Sanitary Commission, and who have been with this fleet distributing sanitary goods for the benefit of sick soldiers.
While Mrs. Couzins thus gave herself to mitigating the sufferings of the "boys in blue," in camp and hospital, Mrs. Minor was no less active and energetic in the equally important department of preserving supplies for the sanitary commission. Although Mrs. Minor resided too far from the city to attend the evening meetings, and her name does not appear in the accounts of such gatherings, she was one of the first members of the Ladies' Union Aid Society of St. Louis, and took part in the meeting of loyal women called and presided over by Gen. Curtis. Having an orchard and dairy on her place, she furnished the hospital with milk and fruit, and for more than two years, sent a supply every day to the soldiers in camp at Benton barracks. When the news came that the army around Vicksburg was suffering with scurvy, she took her carriage and drove through the country soliciting fruit, and in one week she canned with her own hands, a wagon-load of cherries, the sanitary commission finding the cans and sugar, and from time to time she continued the work until the end of the war. When the great fair was held under the auspices of the Western Sanitary Commission, she was a member of
