Mary A. Gardner Holland

[2][3][4] The book begins with an introduction by Holland herself; she writes "what more fitting place for women with holy motives and tenderest sympathy than on those fields of blood and death or in retreats prepared for our suffering heroes?

"[5] According to Holland's account, she worked in hospitals for about fourteen months.

She would have enlisted earlier, she writes, if she didn't have an aging mother depending upon her.

[6] Ultimately, Holland cared for her mother during the day then worked with the Sanitary Commission on weekday evenings until Holland wrote to Dorothea Dix asking to be recruited.

[7] Holland was stationed at Columbia College Hospital in Meridian Heights, a suburb of Washington, D.C. From there she went to West Washington and then to Annapolis, serving as a matron.