Robison Family Endures Un-Civil War - Part 3
The Industrious Ladies Do Their Bit
Judging from the letters that passed among the members of the Robison family during the Civil War, the women of Bloomsburg were eager to support the Union troops and stayed busy doing so. The following letter from Isabella (Bell) Robison, age 30, indicates that by December 1861, Bloomsburg's war relief efforts were already underway. And just as the town’s churches were the centers of its social life, they were also the centers of the relief efforts.
Dec. 2, 1861
We had a good union meeting here Thanksgiving day. All the Churches united except the Episcopal. The meeting was in our church [the Presbyterian], five ministers in the pulpit.
We are going to have a meeting this afternoon in the lecture room of the Presbyterian church for the purpose of raising a society for soldiers.
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| Fig. 1: Bloomsburg’s old Presbyterian Church, built in 1848, stood on the east side of Market St. near 3rd where now stands the Yorks/Yost mansion. (Courtesy the Columbia County Historical & Genealogical Society) |
Local war relief efforts were often tied to social events. Augusta (Gus) Robison, age 26, describes one such Bloomsburg event in a letter dated Aug. 18th 1862:
Dear Sister,
The festival came off and there was a perfect jam both Thursday and Friday evenings. The lions were Lieut. Rickets & Jim Chamberlain who are both here recruiting. The Lieut. was very attentive to us. I presume it was on account of Jane attending his brother…The festival was gotten up by the young girls of Alta Rupert’s age. They cleared one hundred and ninety dollars..[adjusted for inflation, that would be $4035 in today’s dollars].We expect to send a box of clothing to Falls Church [Virginia] today. Last week they sent edibles to them. Oh! Alice, our cakes were beautiful.
--Gus
The first lion mentioned was, of course, Robert Bruce Ricketts (1839–1918), whose conduct during the battle of Gettysburg would make him a bit of a hero (at least locally). Ricketts served nearly four years of the war with Battery F of the 1st Pennsylvania Light Artillery, most of the time as its commander. He and his battery fought in the battles of Dranesville, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Auburn, Bristoe Station, Wilderness, Spotsylvania Court House, North Anna, Cold Harbor, Second Battle of Petersburg, and Deep Bottom. But Gettysburg was his greatest test. During the second day of the battle, his battery was positioned in a key spot on Cemetery Hill when two Confederate brigades charged up the hill. Ricketts and his men refused to abandon their canons and instead engaged in hand to hand combat with the Rebels until reinforcements arrived.
After the war Col. Ricketts settled in Wilkes-Barre and began buying vast tracts of heavily-wooded land on North Mountain in Luzerne, Sullivan, and Columbia counties. Along with other investors, he opened a saw mill and became a sort of lumber baron. A few years after his death in 1918, his heirs began selling pieces of his 80,000 acres to the state. The key 1,261 acres that included the falls and lower glen were sold to the state in 1942 and became the nucleus for Ricketts Glen State Park. More state acquisitions during the 1940s allowed the park to include Lake Jean and Ganoga Lake for a total of 13,050 acres.
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| Fig. 2: Col. Robert Bruce Ricketts |
Bruce Ricketts and his older brother William were raised in Orangeville and both were early volunteers to the Union Army. A former West Point cadet, William organized the first company of volunteers from this area (Company A, 35th Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteers). Made up of a lot of men from Danville (which was known for its iron industry), the company was called “The Iron Guards.” William was elected the company commander and given the rank of colonel.
While his company was encamped in the Washington, D.C. area in 1862, Ricketts had contracted typhoid fever. One of his nurses at that time was Augusta’s older sister Jane Robison Eliot (who spent most of the war serving as a nurse in various Washington D. C. hospitals). Col. William Ricketts had returned home to Orangeville and was being nursed there when he died of his disease on August 10, 1862. He is buried in nearby Laurel Hill Cemetery.
The second “lion” mentioned by Augusta was 22 year-old Jim Chamberlain, who on July 13, 1861, had volunteered for the Union Army as a private. He later became Adjutant for the 13th Regiment and finally Major of the 178th Regiment Drafted Militia. Before the war Chamberlain had been living in the home of his employer Isaiah McKelvy. A Presbyterian and a Republican, McKelvy owned a flour mill, canal boats, and a large store on the lot on the square where the First National Bank would later stand and where now stands the PNC Bank building.
Another Bloomsburg social event dedicated to the war efforts was mentioned by Augusta’s sister Bell Robison in one of her letters from later in the war (Sept. 29, 1862). It indicates the townspeople were using entertainment events as fundraisers:
The exhibition tonight is not the Glee Club as I said but a number of little girls are going to act dialogues and the proceeds are to be appropriated to the aid of the soldiers so I think we will go.
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| Fig. 3: Isabella (Bell) Robison |
Life in Bloomsburg was, of course, not all fun and games. During the war Bell and her sisters and friends also spent a lot of time doing work for the benefit of soldier relief. One chore they did, for example, was to knit socks and mittens for the troops. Bell writes:
Bloomsburg 15th Nov. 1861
Julia Rupert and I have been very busy going around getting yarn, money, knitters, etc. etc. for the soldiers. The money we send to the factory and get yarn for 50 cts. per lb. As it is for the soldiers Sands lets us have it at the cost of the wool. I have knit one pr. [of socks] and will start another soon as I can. Mother has knit two prs. besides the four prs. she knit for the boys and is ready for another soon as we get the yarn. We intend to form a society, think the Ministers will give it out on Sunday in the different churches. The next thing we think of doing is to get up a box of hospital stores; think it can be gotten without much trouble.
Julia Rupert, age 36, was another member of the extended Robison family. She was the spinster daughter of Andrew Rupert, who had married Martha Robison after his wife (Julia’s mother) had died.
Meanwhile, on the front lines in Virginia, Boyd Robison had gotten soaked by freezing rain (this was in December) while on guard duty, had gotten a chill and developed a fever that took him two weeks to recover from. Anyway, while he was recovering, he got word that his sister was knitting him some mittens. In a letter home he gave the following practical advice to Bloomsburg's lady-knitters:
I feel the need of those mittens Augusta is knitting...By the by, if they have not the fore finger & the thumb separate from each other & from the rest they will be useless in handling a gun cartridge, etc.
Betsey Robison (age 62 when the war began) seems to have worked like a dog all during the war, caring for a large family, her ill husband William (age 72), and her sickly elderly sister. In one letter she mentioned that she gets up at 5 a.m. every day, and in another she commented: "Everything tells me I am growing old fast and believe tis nothing but want of rest." She seemed to get no relief herself, yet she found time to contribute to the relief of the soldiers, as she describes in the following letter:
Bloomsburg July 14, 1862
The cherries are all on the drying boards that I intend to dry. We have used cherries in every way, stewed, baked, canned & dried. We got 100 quarts from up town. Then we told them they might have all the rest & I should wonder if they got twice that many. Could I have afforded cans [jars] I would have canned all or nearly to send to the sick soldiers but dried ones will taste good, and they shall have a good portion of them. And I have made some current jelly...
-- Mother
THE ROBISON GIRLS SEE THE WAR CLOSE UP AND PERSONAL
When the Civil War began, eldest Robison daughter Jane, age 43, was living in Washington, D. C., doing various things to eke out a living and getting little help from her chronically under-employed husband. She had worked as a teacher and had attended business school. When the war broke out, she began working as a nurse in the various hospitals around the city (there were 56 of them in all). Many of the hospitals were mobile, moving from location to location, usually from government building to government building. One of Jane's hospitals was in the Patent Office, for example. She also occasionally worked out of some of the field hospitals that were set up on riverboats or in tents right at the battlefront.
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| Fig. 4: Jane Robison Eliot |
In one of her letters home, Jane described a particularly difficult week in July of 1963:
Washington, D. C. 20 July/1863
I had been to two hospitals in the morning and as it was a very warm day I did too much and was sick the next day...The next I went to see what had become of my ambulance...As I was not able to go out, I came back worse than I went and was not able to go out for several days, in the mean time the battle of Gettysburg came off and if I had been well enough I would have gone up. Before I was able to do anything Gen. Meredith came here wounded and ...I sat by the bed and kept ice water to his head...He was struck in the side of the head by a piece of a shell which stunned him. His horse was killed at the same time falling on his right leg holding him down and when his horse made his last gasp he threw his head back striking Meredith in the left side mashing in two of his ribs and injuring him internally.
--Jane
Standing at 6 ft.-7-inches, Brigadier General Solomon Meredith of Indiana was often called “Long Sol.” He was a bit of a maverick, and many people said it was a blessing in disguise when the serious injuries he suffered at Gettysburg put him out of action for the rest of the war.
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| Fig. 5: General Solomon Meredith |
While Jane missed the battle of Gettysburg, her sister’s stepson Ario Pardee, Jr., did not. In fact, if you go to the battlefield today, you'll find a stone marker in the center of "Pardee Field" at the base of Culp's hill. The inscription on the marker reads: "At 5 A.M. the 147th Pennsylvania Volunteers (Lt. Col. Ario Pardee Jr.) was ordered to charge and carry the stone wall occupied by the enemy. This they did in handsome style, their firing causing heavy loss to the enemy who then abandoned the entire line of the stone wall."
Jane also missed the Second Battle of Manasses (aka, Second Battle of Bull Run). She had tried to get to the front lines but couldn't secure any sort of transportation. So she stayed in Washington awaiting the outcome of the battle. She feared that a defeat would mean she and her city would be overrun by the enemy, while victory would mean her hospital would be overrun by patients (actually, that would happen no matter which side won the battle). As she waited she expressed her feelings in the following letter:
Washington, D. C. 31st Aug. 1862
I am writing with a pencil on my lap because I am at one of the hospitals. I came to see if I can be of use and as the patients have not come yet, I can write a few lines.
...one of the Surgeons just came in and said that musketry could be heard distinctly, so they [the Confederates] may be near enough to have brought in McCalls Division. [General George McCall of the Pennsylvania Reserves] I tried very hard yesterday to get to the battlefield but finally had to give it up...All the convalescents were sent from the hospitals last night & today to make room for the wounded from Manasses. Most people think that tomorrow will be the decisive day. I am afraid our green troops are being mowed down like grass. I do not feel any apprehension about the city or myself. In fact I think if we cannot hold the city we ought to lose it. There seems to be mismanagement somewhere. --Jane
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| Fig. 6: A ward in the Carver General Hospital, Washington, D.C. (Image courtesy the National Archives) |
In 1864, after having apparently grown bored of knitting socks in Bloomsburg, Bell Robison (who was still unmarried at the advanced age of 33) joined her sister Jane in Washington to also work as a nurse. Besides serving in the city hospitals, Bell would also work aboard a number of hospital boats -- steamboats set up as mobile hospitals -- and she worked out of tents on the battlefront. Here follows a series of three letters detailing her experiences on both land and water during Grant’s Overland Campaign against Lee. The first battle of the campaign was the Battle of the Wilderness (May 5-7), which took place just to the west of Fredericksburg, VA, and it was followed by the Battle of Spotsylvania Courthouse (May 8-21), which took place just south of Fredericksburg.
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| Fig. 7: A Union Navy hospital ship like the one on which Bell worked. (Courtesy United States Naval Historical Center) |
Steamer Keys Port 11 May/1864
I am on my way to Fredericksburg, Va., or at least we started for there but have just been asked (Hal and I) to go on the Hospital Streamer Connecticut and assist in taking care of the wounded as they are brought to Washington. This boat brought a load of wounded and there were two loads of wounded at the wharf when we came down. Seven boat loads have gone to Washington...Last night I had no quarters. Lodged with the surgeons but didn't sleep at all. -- Bell
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| Fig. 8: Interior of hospital ship/steamboat. |
After writing that letter, Bell apparently got a last-minute change of assignment, because she seems to have spent the rest of the day and the next working out of tents near the battlefront.
Belle Plain 12th May/1864
We are within about ten miles of Fredericksburg, hear the cannonading very distinctly...I got completely drenched yesterday, was dressing wounds and was obliged to keep the wet clothes on all night. Had damp straw to lie on, my water proof hood on my head, and my blanket shawl and an army blanket that Dr. C. insisted on me taking; had his overcoat and a gum blanket for himself. So I was fixed 10 times better than many of the soldiers...
I went to work soon as I arrived yesterday. Dressed some terrible wounds, was afraid to undertake at first but now I don't hesitate at all...I dressed one wound this morning that had maggots in it, though I think that could have been avoided by keeping it well wet which is very necessary. The wounded are being taken away and the well ones coming to go to the front. Last night the Guerrillas captured twenty of our ambulance teams. Took 40 horses and the drivers and left the ambulances stand with the wounded in them...
I forgot to say that last evening about 1500 wounded of the 5th Corps arrived here and as there was no place to put them were obliged to remain in the ambulances...
The cry from Fredericksburg is for lint and bandages, men dying for want of having their wounds dressed. Two thousand it is said will die from mortification...I hear there is an ambulance train two miles long and ready to come in.
I washed my face this morning, the first time since I came off the boat. -- Bell
During the campaign an average of 2000 wounded soldiers per day were coming off the battlefields. The Battle of the Wilderness alone had resulted in about 12,000 wounded men. Another 13,416 men were wounded during the battle of Spotsylvania Courthouse.
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| Fig. 9: An ambulance crew during a training exercise. |
Nine days would pass before Bell could find enough free time to write again. There was still plenty work to do caring for the wounded, but Bell also took up another task – writing fallen soldiers’ names on pieces of board that served as grave markers.
Fredericksburg Va 21st May 1864
I worked too hard today and my feet are so sore I can scarcely stand on them...
Oh how much I've wished I had supplies to have given every soldier I see who asks for something to eat. They would give almost anything for some soft bread or decent crackers. We have been obliged to feed hard tack most of the time and it does go so hard for our severely wounded men. I dislike it, and I am well. Have been obliged to live on it most of the time myself.
Today I went to one of the burying grounds to look after three I had board markers for...While I was there they [the gravediggers] were covering three and there were 17 lying in a row to be buried. Two were those I had boards marked for. And only two were in boxes. All just rolled in their blankets and some of them not even covered. It is sad, sad to see such sights. -- Bell
As nurses to the soldiers, Bell and Jane would see many more sad sights before the war’s end.
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| Fig. 10: The burying of the dead at Fredericksburg, VA, after the Wilderness campaign, May 1864. (Image courtesy the National Archives) |
