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“Economy Rules the Day:”
The Civil War Sacrifices of Judith Walker McGuire
by Tim Sheehan

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The Robertson Hospital (continued)

Judith McGuire’s Diary pays tribute to those whom had died at the Robertson Hospital. One of the first Robertson patients McGuire adored was Nathan Newton, a young soldier suffering from typhoid fever. McGuire reports in the Diary, with great remorse, Newton’s age as fifteen. Newton was actually thirteen approaching fourteen, according to U.S. Census records. Military records also list him as a private in his father’s Company G Alabama 26th Regiment, an even more shocking fact not mentioned in the Diary. The motherly instinct in McGuire must have drawn her to Newton. In her 23 February 1862 entry, McGuire states she went to the Robertson Hospital, “particularly to nurse our little soldier boy (meaning Newton).” Suffering from delirium, Newton thought McGuire and other women volunteers were his mother due to the maternal presence these women provided him. McGuire claims in the Diary she was at the bedside of Newton on 9 April 1862, closing his dark eyes after his life ended. At the end of this entry, McGuire provides to the reader Caroline Augusta Ball’s “Jacket of Gray,” a poem about a young Confederate volunteer’s death. (51)

The hospital setting sometimes put quite a damper on McGuire’s spirits. The suffering she witnessed often overwhelmed her. On 8 January 1865, Judith McGuire wrote of walking home “with my heart full of the sorrows of hospital-life.” That day, the sister of a dying soldier “hung over him in agony,” an emotional scene for McGuire to witness. Scenes from the hospital and news of the war gradually wore away at her patriotic spirit. “I wish I could sleep until it is over — a selfish wish enough; but it is hard to witness so much sorrow which you cannot alleviate.” (52)

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This page last updated 23 August 2008