The Diary of a Civil War Nurse

Dear Diary,
I despise working in these horrid battles! Women, young and old, are working to help save soldiers, yet it feels like we are losing more men then we are saving.
The battlefields are littered with bloody bodies. Every day, more and more men are brought to our tents. Their cries for help, for mercy, for victory over death will forever be emblazed in my mind. So many plead for our assistence, but there does not seem to be enough of us to save or even attempt to treat them all.
Do not get me wrong, dear diary, for we are indeed working hastily in the hospital tents, but sometimes I feel as if I do not have the strength to withstand till the end. The screams of men as they undergo agonizing procedures and the weeping that can just barely be heard as the soldiers drift into a never-ending sleep...such sounds shatter my confidence in a victorious war.
I just hope that the blissful memories of my home will overpower the ferocious recollections of this bloody battlefield. Only then will I truly be at peace.




-With Love,



Martha Whitmen