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From: "Dennis J. Francis" <>
Subject: [CIVIL-WAR-IRISH] Book: "To Bind Up the Wounds"
Date: Sun, 27 Aug 2000 03:18:47 -0400


This one is a bit of departure from soldiering:

"To Bind Up the Wounds: Catholic Sister Nurses in the US Civil War", by
Sister Mary Denis Maher, Greenwood Press, New York, 1989; reprint by
Louisiana State University Press, ISBN 0-8071-2439-7.

At the corner of Rhode Island and Connecticut Avenues in Washington DC
is a monument erected in 1924, memorializing the "Nuns of the
Battlefield", who sought to repair the damage wrought by war and
disease, regardless of one's uniform or religious persuasion. Once you
read "To Bind Up the Wounds", you'll understand why the monument is
there.

In 1860, nursing wasn't the profession it is today. By and large, it
was considered a menial job, and it wasn't considered proper for a lady
to tend to a bunch of strange men (even at the height of the war, this
attitude didn't quite go away). So when the war began in earnest and
casualties began coming in, both North and South needed to find a corps
of trained and dedicated people to provide proper care to the sick and
wounded, and find them quickly. Almost immediately, both sides turned
to the convents for help. The Sisters willingly responded, sometimes
setting aside their usual ministries, such as education, to meet the
need.

At least 617 Sisters from 21 religious communities of 12 different
orders worked as nurses during the War, of whom 320 were Irish-born or
of Irish descent.

Sr. Mary Denis Maher does an outstanding job in telling their story.
She starts out with a bit of background - a history of Catholic Sisters
in America up to that time, as well as their experience in nursing.
>From there, she covers medical care during the CW and the various
organizations for lay female nurses, then goes into the experiences the
Sisters had. Finally, she writes about how others perceived them;
considering the widespread anti-Catholic and Know-Nothing sentiments in
19th-century America, this chapter is very interesting:

With their faith to sustain them and the skills and discipline they had
obtained by living in community, the Sisters were often preferred over
their lay counterparts by the doctors.

A bit of humor: for many, if not most, of the soldiers, being in the
hospital was the first encounter they had with a nun, and the sight of
the sisters' habits, especially the "flying nun" bonnets, often made
them initially uneasy, even terrified.

It's a scholarly study, well researched and end-noted, but also easy to
read. From a genealogy standpoint, comparatively few individual nuns
are specifically mentioned, but the bibliography lists the archival
sources for the religious communities and plenty of other references for
further research.

Dennis
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