Hannah could not sleep that night thinking of the sick man. Bright and early the next morning she came down and found him still alive. That settled it in her mind. Without asking any one's permission, she went out, looked up her two strapping sons and made them leave their work and bring her bed down to the hospital. It was covered with coarse but clean linen sheets and she directed them while they lifted the sufferer on to the bed and carried him down to her shanty. There she cut away the filthy shirt which he wore and washed him like a baby with hot water. Then she settled down to nurse him back to life. Every half hour, night and day, she fed him spoonfuls of hot, nourishing soup. That and warm water and clean linen were the only medicines she used. For a week she did nothing else but nurse her soldier. Several times he sank and once she thought him dead, but he always rallied and single-handed old Hannah fought back death and slowly nursed him back to health. Finally when he was well, he was given a furlough to go back to his home in Indiana. He tried to persuade Hannah to go back with him. "No, honey," she said, "I'se got my washing to do and besides I'm goin' to try to adopt some more soldiers." She went with him to the steamboat, fixed him in a deck chair, as he was still too feeble to walk, and kissed him good-bye and when she left the man broke down and cried. Old Hannah went back to her shanty and did the same thing again and again until she had nursed back to life no less than six Union soldiers. As she was not in active service, the government never recognized her work and even her last name was never known, but six men and their families and their friends have handed down the story of what a poor, old, black washerwoman could and did do for her country and for the sick and helpless. The exploit of Lieutenant Blodgett and his orderly, Peter Basnett, was a brave deed of another kind. He had been sent by General Schofield during the engagement at Newtonia with orders to the colonel of the Fourth Missouri Cavalry. As the two rode around a point of woods, they suddenly found themselves facing forty Confederate soldiers drawn up in an irregular line not fifty yards away. There was no chance of escape, as they would be riddled with bullets at such a short range. Moreover neither the lieutenant nor his orderly thought well of surrendering. Without an instant's hesitation they at once drew their revolvers and charging down upon the Confederates, shouted in loud, though rather shaky voices, "Surrender! Drop your arms! Surrender at once!" The line wavered, feeling that two men would not have the audacity to charge them unless they were followed by an overwhelming force. As they came right up to the lines, eight of the men in front threw down their muskets. The rest hesitated a minute and then turned and broke for the woods and the lieutenant and his orderly rode on and delivered eight prisoners along with their orders.