He listened to the story of suffering and faithlessness, and hurried from my presence, with lips compressed and face like ashes. At ten he stood in the War Department. They could not credit his report. He must have been deceived by some frightened villain. No official report of unusual suffering had reached them. Nothing had been called for by the military authorities commanding Fredericksburg. Mr. Wilson assured them that the officers in trust there were not to be relied upon. They were faithless, overcome by the blandishments of the wily inhabitants. Still the Department doubted. It was then that he proved that my confidence in his firmness was not misplaced, as, facing his doubters he replies: “One of two things will have to be done--either you will send some one to-night with the power to investigate and correct the abuses of our wounded men at Fredericksburg, or the Senate will send some one to-morrow.” This threat recalled their scattered senses. At two o’clock in the morning the Quartermaster-General and staff galloped to the 6th Street wharf under orders; at ten they were in Fredericksburg. At noon the wounded men were fed from the food of the city and the houses were opened to the “_dirty, lousy_ soldiers” of the Union Army. Both railroad and canal were opened. In three days I returned with carloads of supplies. No more jolting in army wagons! And every man who left Fredericksburg by boat or by car owes it to the firm decision of one man that his grating bones were not dragged ten miles across the country or left to bleach in the sands of that city. Yes, they owed it all to Senator Wilson. And he owed it to Clara Barton. Why was there such neglect, and why did no one else report it? The surgeons on the front were busy, and they did not see it. The surgeons and nurses in the base hospitals were busy, and they knew nothing of it. Military commanders only knew that the roads were bad, and that it was difficult to move troops to the front or wounded men back to the rear, but supposed that the best was being made of a bad matter. But Clara Barton knew that, if some one in authority could realize that thousands of men were suffering needless agony and hundreds were dying who might be saved, something would be done. Something was done; and many a soldier who lived and regained his health had reason, without knowing it, to bless the name of Clara Barton. At the close of the Wilderness campaign, Clara Barton found time to answer some letters and acknowledge some remittances. In one of these letters she answered the question why, being as she was in close touch and entire sympathy with the work of the Sanitary and Christian Commissions, she still continued to do her work independently. It is a thoroughly characteristic letter: May 30, 1864