Heroines of Mercy Street

Companion to the PBS drama Mercy Street, the true stories of the nurses at the Mansion House Civil War hospital. Among the Union soldiers, doctors, wounded men from both sides, freed slaves, politicians, speculators, and spies who passed through the hospital in the crossroads of the Civil War, were nurses who gave their time freely and willingly to save lives and aid the wounded. These women saw casualties on a scale Americans had never seen before, and medicine was at a turning point. Heroines of Mercy Street follows the lives of women like Dorothea Dix, Mary Phinney, Anne Reading, and more before, during, and after their epic struggle in Alexandria, Virginia and reveals their personal contributions to this astounding period in the advancement of medicine. "Accessible and well researched . . . Successfully illustrates the beginnings of nursing as a designated field of medical practice."― Library Journal