She was a successful administrator, especially at the hospital for black soldiers at City Point, Virginia. She worked in hospitals after the battles of Antietam, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg. She supervised supplies, dressed wounds, and cooked special foods for patients on a limited diet. Gilson (1835–68) of Chelsea, Massachusetts, who served in Sanitary Commission. They gave good cheer, wrote letters the men dictated, and comforted the dying.
They assisted surgeons during procedures, gave medicines, supervised the feedings and cleaned the bedding and clothes. North and South, over 20,000 women volunteered to work in hospitals, usually in nursing care. Dorothea Dix, serving as the Commission's Superintendent, was able to convince the medical corps of the value of women working in 350 Commission or Army hospitals. During the Civil War (1861–65), the United States Sanitary Commission, a federal civilian agency, handled most of the medical and nursing care of the Union armies, together with necessary acquisition and transportation of medical supplies.
