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Hospital Sketches
"Hospital Sketches" is a fictionalised account of Louisa May Alcott's experiences nursing during the Civil War and presented in a collection of letters. The book garnered Alcott's first critical recognition for her observations and humour.
Tribulation Periwinkle, looking for something to do, follow the suggestion of her brother, Tom, and decided to become a nurse for the Union Army. However, her difficulties begin before she even gets to the hospital. She describes the inconveniences of travel on her way to Washington, D.C. Once Nurse Periwinkle arrives at the Hurly-Burly Hotel, a temporary hospital, she has to learn how to nurse.
Tribulation Periwinkle, looking for something to do, follow the suggestion of her brother, Tom, and decided to become a nurse for the Union Army. However, her difficulties begin before she even gets to the hospital. She describes the inconveniences of travel on her way to Washington, D.C. Once Nurse Periwinkle arrives at the Hurly-Burly Hotel, a temporary hospital, she has to learn how to nurse.
80 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1863
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4067 people want to read
About the author
Louisa May Alcott
4,044 books10.6k followersLouisa May Alcott was an American novelist, short story writer, and poet best known for writing the novel Little Women (1868) and its sequels Good Wives (1869), Little Men (1871) and Jo's Boys (1886). Raised in New England by her transcendentalist parents, Abigail May Alcott and Amos Bronson Alcott, she grew up among many well-known intellectuals of the day, including Margaret Fuller, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry David Thoreau, and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
Alcott's family suffered from financial difficulties, and while she worked to help support the family from an early age, she also sought an outlet in writing. She began to receive critical success for her writing in the 1860s. Early in her career, she sometimes used pen names such as A.M. Barnard, under which she wrote lurid short stories and sensation novels for adults that focused on passion and revenge.
Published in 1868, Little Women is set in the Alcott family home, Orchard House, in Concord, Massachusetts, and is loosely based on Alcott's childhood experiences with her three sisters, Abigail May Alcott Nieriker, Elizabeth Sewall Alcott, and Anna Bronson Alcott Pratt. The novel was well-received at the time and is still popular today among both children and adults. It has been adapted for stage plays, films, and television many times.
Alcott was an abolitionist and a feminist and remained unmarried throughout her life. She also spent her life active in reform movements such as temperance and women's suffrage. She died from a stroke in Boston on March 6, 1888, just two days after her father's death.
Alcott's family suffered from financial difficulties, and while she worked to help support the family from an early age, she also sought an outlet in writing. She began to receive critical success for her writing in the 1860s. Early in her career, she sometimes used pen names such as A.M. Barnard, under which she wrote lurid short stories and sensation novels for adults that focused on passion and revenge.
Published in 1868, Little Women is set in the Alcott family home, Orchard House, in Concord, Massachusetts, and is loosely based on Alcott's childhood experiences with her three sisters, Abigail May Alcott Nieriker, Elizabeth Sewall Alcott, and Anna Bronson Alcott Pratt. The novel was well-received at the time and is still popular today among both children and adults. It has been adapted for stage plays, films, and television many times.
Alcott was an abolitionist and a feminist and remained unmarried throughout her life. She also spent her life active in reform movements such as temperance and women's suffrage. She died from a stroke in Boston on March 6, 1888, just two days after her father's death.
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November 22, 2021
Tribulation Periwinkle has gone from her home in the North to Washington D.C. to be a nurse for the wounded soldiers of the Army of the Potomac. She describes, in what reads like a diary of recollections, her trip from home to D.C., her arrival at the understaffed hospital, where she is thrown into the care of dying men, and her own subsequent illness that takes her back to her home again.
Several of the vignettes are quite poignant, recounting the suffering and dying around her. She also tackles the attitudes and treatment of the black servants that work in and around the hospital, and who receive as harsh a rejection from these Northerners as they might have expected from the South, which gives Alcott a forum to advocate for more than Abolition, but also for fair treatment of these newly freed men.
This is a quick read and an important one. Louisa May Alcott writes fiction, but it is informed by personal experience, and her own nursing of soldiers during the Civil War makes this a very realistic depiction. An early advocate for rights for both women and blacks, Alcott is a voice of the future and a glimpse into the past.
Several of the vignettes are quite poignant, recounting the suffering and dying around her. She also tackles the attitudes and treatment of the black servants that work in and around the hospital, and who receive as harsh a rejection from these Northerners as they might have expected from the South, which gives Alcott a forum to advocate for more than Abolition, but also for fair treatment of these newly freed men.
This is a quick read and an important one. Louisa May Alcott writes fiction, but it is informed by personal experience, and her own nursing of soldiers during the Civil War makes this a very realistic depiction. An early advocate for rights for both women and blacks, Alcott is a voice of the future and a glimpse into the past.
March 28, 2019
3.5 This is going to be a short review, since I just reviewed [book:Louisa on the Front Lines: Louisa May Alcott in the Civil War|40537448 a few days ago. I was surprised at how much of that book was directly quoted from this one. Though I did like reading this, since it was wholly Louisas thoughts without authors comments. This book was mentioned several time in the Civil War book which is what piqued my interest in this one.
April 25, 2019
I like this because reading about Alcott’s firsthand experiences being a nurse during the Civil War is just plain interesting. How many such accounts written by acclaimed authors could there be? What we are told feels very real and honest. Secondly, I like it because you et a grip on Alcott’s personality. Thirdly, I like it because she weaves in humor. As she states at the end, it is important “to look well after the cheerfulness in life”. Without this attitude a book such as this could easily become dark and dreary. However, do not think that she shies away from that which sad and grisly
Alcott is outspoken, alternately criticizing and praising. She is determined and intelligent. She has spunk. Her personal attributes come through in the text.
Be warned, Alcott does not express herself as we do today. She uses words, idioms and manners of speech less frequently employed nowadays. To appreciate the elegance of her lines a reader must pay attention. It is not wrong to state that her writing is somewhat dated, but this doesn’t matter if you are willing to make an effort to understand.
Alcott had intended a three month stint as a nurse at Hurly Burly House in Washington. She became ill and had to go home sooner.
So why not more stars? It is not a wow book, even if I am glad to have read it.
Anne Hancock narrates the audiobook. I didn’t like her narration at all. Her tone is too light and sweet. She reads too fast. Prose that is dated must be read at a slower pace. She catches the levity in the author’s lines but lacks the ability to properly alter her intonation for lines of serious portent.
*************************
Interested in other nurse memoirs? Check out this: The Backwash of War: The Human Wreckage of the Battlefield as Witnessed by an American Hospital Nurse (5 stars)
It is for the First World War, not the Civil War.
Cynda pointed out these two books
1.A Black Woman's Civil War Memiors by Susie King Taylor
2.Memoranda during the War by Walt Whitman
which could be of interest too!
Alcott is outspoken, alternately criticizing and praising. She is determined and intelligent. She has spunk. Her personal attributes come through in the text.
Be warned, Alcott does not express herself as we do today. She uses words, idioms and manners of speech less frequently employed nowadays. To appreciate the elegance of her lines a reader must pay attention. It is not wrong to state that her writing is somewhat dated, but this doesn’t matter if you are willing to make an effort to understand.
Alcott had intended a three month stint as a nurse at Hurly Burly House in Washington. She became ill and had to go home sooner.
So why not more stars? It is not a wow book, even if I am glad to have read it.
Anne Hancock narrates the audiobook. I didn’t like her narration at all. Her tone is too light and sweet. She reads too fast. Prose that is dated must be read at a slower pace. She catches the levity in the author’s lines but lacks the ability to properly alter her intonation for lines of serious portent.
*************************
Interested in other nurse memoirs? Check out this: The Backwash of War: The Human Wreckage of the Battlefield as Witnessed by an American Hospital Nurse (5 stars)
It is for the First World War, not the Civil War.
Cynda pointed out these two books
1.A Black Woman's Civil War Memiors by Susie King Taylor
2.Memoranda during the War by Walt Whitman
which could be of interest too!
December 24, 2016
I read this concurrently with Becoming Dickens: The Invention of a Novelist -- unintentionally, but appropriately -- as not only was Dickens one of Alcott's favorite writers, but this fictionalized memoir of Alcott’s could be said to have led to her “becoming Louisa May Alcott”.
Similar to the start of the Dickens phenomenon with The Pickwick Papers being published under the name of “Boz”, Alcott gained her first bout of fame with this work, writing under the pseudonym of "Tribulation Periwinkle" (one sees the Dickens influence immediately). Her short time as a Civil War nurse in a Union hospital is expressed in humorous, sensitive, ironic and impassioned prose. Like her literary hero, she captures the telling details.
Nurse Trib P., reflecting on her life-changing experiences ministering to the wounded and dying under adverse conditions, discovers a philosophy of life, and her own writing style. In much the same way the sketches of The Pickwick Papers led to Dickens’ development of Oliver Twist, Alcott's hospital sketches paved her way toward Little Women.
All of which has me wondering, again, if I would’ve become the Dickens fan I am without my childhood reading of Alcott.
"I'd rather laugh than cry, when I must sing out anyhow, so just say that bit from Dickens again, please, and I'll stand it like a man." He did; for "Mrs. Cluppins," "Chadband," and "Sam Weller," always helped him through; thereby causing me to lay another offering of love and admiration on the shrine of the god of my idolatry, though he does wear too much jewelry and talk slang.
Similar to the start of the Dickens phenomenon with The Pickwick Papers being published under the name of “Boz”, Alcott gained her first bout of fame with this work, writing under the pseudonym of "Tribulation Periwinkle" (one sees the Dickens influence immediately). Her short time as a Civil War nurse in a Union hospital is expressed in humorous, sensitive, ironic and impassioned prose. Like her literary hero, she captures the telling details.
Nurse Trib P., reflecting on her life-changing experiences ministering to the wounded and dying under adverse conditions, discovers a philosophy of life, and her own writing style. In much the same way the sketches of The Pickwick Papers led to Dickens’ development of Oliver Twist, Alcott's hospital sketches paved her way toward Little Women.
All of which has me wondering, again, if I would’ve become the Dickens fan I am without my childhood reading of Alcott.
"I'd rather laugh than cry, when I must sing out anyhow, so just say that bit from Dickens again, please, and I'll stand it like a man." He did; for "Mrs. Cluppins," "Chadband," and "Sam Weller," always helped him through; thereby causing me to lay another offering of love and admiration on the shrine of the god of my idolatry, though he does wear too much jewelry and talk slang.
August 20, 2020
Chafing at not being able to march off to war because a woman, Alcott decided on her 30th birthday in 1862 to volunteer to be an Army nurse. She served at a hospital in Georgetown for six weeks, caring for casualties of the Battle of Fredericksburg, before contracting typhoid fever.
At the urging of family and friends, she later lightly fictionalized the letters she wrote home describing her experiences, and they appeared to acclaim in newspapers before being collected into this book, which provided her with her first literary success and fame.
She was aware of the humorous tone of most of her sketches, and defended it from some contemporary critics who thought it inappropriate, saying "it is a part of my religion to look well after the cheerfulnesses of life, and let the dismals shift for themselves". Certainly, there are poignant, moving scenes of suffering, sadness and death that are described touchingly, as well.
She was a member of a staunch Abolitionist family and believed fiercely in the cause herself, but it is striking how clearly this coexisted with a sense of white supremacy even as she takes more overt racism to task.
A short read and well worth the time.
At the urging of family and friends, she later lightly fictionalized the letters she wrote home describing her experiences, and they appeared to acclaim in newspapers before being collected into this book, which provided her with her first literary success and fame.
She was aware of the humorous tone of most of her sketches, and defended it from some contemporary critics who thought it inappropriate, saying "it is a part of my religion to look well after the cheerfulnesses of life, and let the dismals shift for themselves". Certainly, there are poignant, moving scenes of suffering, sadness and death that are described touchingly, as well.
She was a member of a staunch Abolitionist family and believed fiercely in the cause herself, but it is striking how clearly this coexisted with a sense of white supremacy even as she takes more overt racism to task.
A short read and well worth the time.
March 15, 2019
Many people don't know about this book, since the one and only Ms. Louisa May Alcott is known more for Little Womenand its sequel Little Men, but for history buffs, of the Civil War especially, this is a must read.
Being a woman permitted to help your fellow beings as a money earning career option when you weren't allowed to before is quite an excitable choice to make. Throughout this book I was told some sad and happy tales of being a Union hospital nurse during the war that divided families, friends, business associates, etc. At times I found this book a bit to wordy, which made it longer than I would have liked it. Since these are memories from different people it makes sense and even respectable to keep them as lengthy to respect the sacrifices being made by men and women at this time. Ms. Alcott's experiences during her own time as a Union nurse helps to give this book a very realistic feel. It was hard to read at times but it was worth it in the end.
Being a woman permitted to help your fellow beings as a money earning career option when you weren't allowed to before is quite an excitable choice to make. Throughout this book I was told some sad and happy tales of being a Union hospital nurse during the war that divided families, friends, business associates, etc. At times I found this book a bit to wordy, which made it longer than I would have liked it. Since these are memories from different people it makes sense and even respectable to keep them as lengthy to respect the sacrifices being made by men and women at this time. Ms. Alcott's experiences during her own time as a Union nurse helps to give this book a very realistic feel. It was hard to read at times but it was worth it in the end.
April 4, 2024
Despite its primary setting in a civil war hospital, this short little book is as funny as all get out. LMA clearly had the ability to look at life through a generously humorous lens, and she (obviously) knew how to tell a tale. To start with, she calls herself Tribulation Periwinkle in this story. Wait until you hear her names for her sisters and her brother-in-law. 🤣
She also has the unique ability of having ideals for herself... And knowing where she falls short of them. She is brutally honest about herself and her contradictions, which not many people are. That's not what this book is about, but I noticed it as I was reading.
As much as it made me laugh, it also makes me cry, as a book set in a war hospital should. My only complaint is that it is short. But then, LMA had the
same complaint. Her service as army nurse was cut short by illness and subsequent poor health. But then, that enabled her to focus on her writing, and the world is better off for that.
She also has the unique ability of having ideals for herself... And knowing where she falls short of them. She is brutally honest about herself and her contradictions, which not many people are. That's not what this book is about, but I noticed it as I was reading.
As much as it made me laugh, it also makes me cry, as a book set in a war hospital should. My only complaint is that it is short. But then, LMA had the
same complaint. Her service as army nurse was cut short by illness and subsequent poor health. But then, that enabled her to focus on her writing, and the world is better off for that.
March 30, 2023
5+ stars & 6/10 hearts. Oh my. I enjoyed this little book so much. It was really hilarious. Louisa May Alcott outdid herself this time. It was all so sarcastic and ridiculous, and yet, it was obvious that there was a foundation of truth and that Nurse Periwinkle was strongly based off Alcott! I don’t agree with everything in this story, but it’s full of sweet anecdotes and little lessons. Definitely a favourite book from one of my favourite authors!
A Favourite Quote: “[T]hough a stranger, John was beloved by all. Each man there had wondered at his patience, respected his piety, admired his fortitude, and now lamented his hard death; for the influence of an upright nature had made itself deeply felt, even in one little week.”
A Favourite Humorous Quote: “...certain printed papers, necessary to be filled out, were given a young gentleman—no, I prefer to say Boy, with a scornful emphasis upon the word, as the only means of revenge now left me. This Boy, instead of doing his duty with the diligence so charming in the young, loitered and lounged, in a manner which proved his education to have been sadly neglected in the—"How doth the little busy bee," direction. He stared at me, gaped out of the window, ate peanuts, and gossiped with his neighbors—Boys, like himself, and all penned in a row, like colts at a Cattle Show. I don't imagine he knew the anguish he was inflicting; for it was nearly three, the train left at five, and I had my ticket to get, my dinner to eat, my blessed sister to see, and the depot to reach, if I didn't die of apoplexy. Meanwhile, Patience certainly had her perfect work that day, and I hope she enjoyed the job more than I did.”
A Favourite Quote: “[T]hough a stranger, John was beloved by all. Each man there had wondered at his patience, respected his piety, admired his fortitude, and now lamented his hard death; for the influence of an upright nature had made itself deeply felt, even in one little week.”
A Favourite Humorous Quote: “...certain printed papers, necessary to be filled out, were given a young gentleman—no, I prefer to say Boy, with a scornful emphasis upon the word, as the only means of revenge now left me. This Boy, instead of doing his duty with the diligence so charming in the young, loitered and lounged, in a manner which proved his education to have been sadly neglected in the—"How doth the little busy bee," direction. He stared at me, gaped out of the window, ate peanuts, and gossiped with his neighbors—Boys, like himself, and all penned in a row, like colts at a Cattle Show. I don't imagine he knew the anguish he was inflicting; for it was nearly three, the train left at five, and I had my ticket to get, my dinner to eat, my blessed sister to see, and the depot to reach, if I didn't die of apoplexy. Meanwhile, Patience certainly had her perfect work that day, and I hope she enjoyed the job more than I did.”
November 6, 2010
Most people know Louisa May Alcott's name for Little Women. They may know her name in relation to her father, Bronson Alcott, and his friendship with dudes like Ralph Waldo Emerson and H.D. Thoreau, and the Transcendentalist movement. Not as many people knew she also went to war.
Alcott spent six weeks working as a nurse in Washington, DC during the Civil War. She went home after a nasty bout of typhoid fever, but those six weeks made quite an impression on her. She turned her experiences there into a short series of "sketches" which eventually were put together into Hospital Sketches. The character Tribulation Periwinkle is based on Louisa's experiences herself. Had she been able to stay longer and seen more, I wonder what the "sketches" would have potentially turned into.
This was a quick read, pretty charming actually. The introduction to my edition was 38 pages long, almost as long as Hospital Sketches itself, and I was surprised that the first part of Alcott's account had to do with the travel to DC; very little actually focused on the hospital scene at all. In a totally selfish way I have to admit I was a bit bugged by that. I also would have preferred if Alcott hadn't made it a fictionalized story - certainly her experiences in those six weeks alone would have been for an interesting read, but it is what it is. Hospitals at that time were pretty grungy from what I understand - body parts lying around in the yard, no sterilization, not much as far as anesthetization, dead bodies hanging around in the middle of summer. Alcott touches on some of those issues, and these stories would certainly open readers' eyes to the reality behind a lot of the other war stories they may have heard.
Interesting to note that the role of women as nurses in hospitals during the Civil War was not to assist the surgeons in their operations - in fact, women weren't often allowed in to witness the operations unless they specifically asked to be a part of it. The role of the nurses was to comfort the soldiers after the surgery. Their role was quite controversial it seems as many thought it imprudent to have women in the rooms at all. 'Cause, y'know, women just want to have sex with anything possessing a penis, and clearly their desire to help the wounded had nothing to do with actually helping the wounded. Pshaw.
(Courtesy of the National Library of Medicine)
Alcott spent six weeks working as a nurse in Washington, DC during the Civil War. She went home after a nasty bout of typhoid fever, but those six weeks made quite an impression on her. She turned her experiences there into a short series of "sketches" which eventually were put together into Hospital Sketches. The character Tribulation Periwinkle is based on Louisa's experiences herself. Had she been able to stay longer and seen more, I wonder what the "sketches" would have potentially turned into.
This was a quick read, pretty charming actually. The introduction to my edition was 38 pages long, almost as long as Hospital Sketches itself, and I was surprised that the first part of Alcott's account had to do with the travel to DC; very little actually focused on the hospital scene at all. In a totally selfish way I have to admit I was a bit bugged by that. I also would have preferred if Alcott hadn't made it a fictionalized story - certainly her experiences in those six weeks alone would have been for an interesting read, but it is what it is. Hospitals at that time were pretty grungy from what I understand - body parts lying around in the yard, no sterilization, not much as far as anesthetization, dead bodies hanging around in the middle of summer. Alcott touches on some of those issues, and these stories would certainly open readers' eyes to the reality behind a lot of the other war stories they may have heard.
Interesting to note that the role of women as nurses in hospitals during the Civil War was not to assist the surgeons in their operations - in fact, women weren't often allowed in to witness the operations unless they specifically asked to be a part of it. The role of the nurses was to comfort the soldiers after the surgery. Their role was quite controversial it seems as many thought it imprudent to have women in the rooms at all. 'Cause, y'know, women just want to have sex with anything possessing a penis, and clearly their desire to help the wounded had nothing to do with actually helping the wounded. Pshaw.
(Courtesy of the National Library of Medicine)
March 19, 2018
It's hard to believe this is one of Louisa May Alcott's earliest published works. Over the course of just a few chapters, she had me both laughing out loud at her inimitable humor and sobbing outright at the pathos of her descriptions. The deathbed scene of a man we hadn't met until we knew he was dying affected me as much as those of any of her better-known and loved characters and had me berating her through my tears for breaking down my guard with her hilarious accounts of the preparations for and accomplishment of her journey.
Content: a few instances of profanity from the soldiers (although most of it is hinted, not written); some attitudes toward black people that might be considered racist by today's standards, although far ahead of much of the thought of the time.
Content: a few instances of profanity from the soldiers (although most of it is hinted, not written); some attitudes toward black people that might be considered racist by today's standards, although far ahead of much of the thought of the time.
February 19, 2022
I love Little Women, but it would never have occurred to me to read this had I not been putting through an order from the PS Books (Postscript) catalogue and spotted it.
This is a very small book (112 pages in my edition) and there is not a wasted word or thought it in. A lightly fictionalised account of Alcott's time as a nurse in Washington DC during the American Civil War, the publication of these vignettes was the real beginning of her successful writing career.
So many of these stories are poignant. I teared up at the death of a Virginian blacksmith called John, and was pleased by Alcott's use of this work to promote fairer treatment of black people. There is also humour in this book and she writes that "it is a part of my religion to look well after the cheerfulnesses of life, and let the dismals shift for themselves". A beautiful work.
This is a very small book (112 pages in my edition) and there is not a wasted word or thought it in. A lightly fictionalised account of Alcott's time as a nurse in Washington DC during the American Civil War, the publication of these vignettes was the real beginning of her successful writing career.
So many of these stories are poignant. I teared up at the death of a Virginian blacksmith called John, and was pleased by Alcott's use of this work to promote fairer treatment of black people. There is also humour in this book and she writes that "it is a part of my religion to look well after the cheerfulnesses of life, and let the dismals shift for themselves". A beautiful work.
November 2, 2025
I loved this "fictionalized account of Louisa May Alcott's experiences nursing during the Civil War" as Nurse Tribulation Periwinkle tells of her desire to help out during the war and her experiences at a hospital in Washington, D.C. helping wounded soldiers. These soldiers' stories are tragic, but Alcott talks about how much the men appreciate any help and attention the nurses can give to them. It is heartbreaking, but also inspiring.
Alcott does such a wonderful job in writing this account. She made me wish it was longer!
I highly recommend this one :)
Alcott does such a wonderful job in writing this account. She made me wish it was longer!
I highly recommend this one :)
December 10, 2014
Hospital Sketches was published in 1863, early in Alcott's writing career. It is a lightly fictionalized account of her six week service as a nurse at a Georgetown hospital during the Civil War. It is compiled from letters written by Alcott during this time. Her service ended early when she contracted typhoid fever. While this work isn't a great piece of writing, it's an important contribution to the history of the war and life in the hospitals at that time for the patients and the people who cared for them. It's also important in the sense that it was a building block, part of the foundation for one of the great American authors of the 19th century.
February 27, 2025
Ambleside Online strikes again - leading me to good books that I had never heard of. This is recommended for something (free reads? Biography? Don’t remember) in Year 10.
Louisa May Alcott had a book of Civil War hospital sketches? What?!
73 pages filled with good humor and tender concern for those in her care…the first chapter(s) were a bit rambunctious and irritating to me, but overall I really enjoyed the book even though there is a lot of heartache too. I think it is filled with examples of great courage from Americans walking through incredibly difficult things - such a bold contrast to what I’ve been reading about in “Bad Therapy” (Shrier) - maybe reading this has been a healthy antidote!
Louisa May Alcott had a book of Civil War hospital sketches? What?!
73 pages filled with good humor and tender concern for those in her care…the first chapter(s) were a bit rambunctious and irritating to me, but overall I really enjoyed the book even though there is a lot of heartache too. I think it is filled with examples of great courage from Americans walking through incredibly difficult things - such a bold contrast to what I’ve been reading about in “Bad Therapy” (Shrier) - maybe reading this has been a healthy antidote!
March 10, 2019
This was a fictional account of Louisa May's time as a nurse during the Civil War. I really enjoyed it.
May 31, 2018
Louisa May Alcott's fictionalized memoir of her experiences as a nurse in Washington D.C. during the Civil War was both witty and moving.
Her descriptions of her efforts to get to her assigned hospital as well as her living conditions whilst there were humorous., while her descriptions of the her duties and the men she nursed were moving and emotional at times, even if sometimes bordering on the sentimental side.
I found her voice and tone in this short work very different than the tone of her more famous works. I imagine that is because there is more of the real Alcott in these sketches than in her longer novels.
Her descriptions of her efforts to get to her assigned hospital as well as her living conditions whilst there were humorous., while her descriptions of the her duties and the men she nursed were moving and emotional at times, even if sometimes bordering on the sentimental side.
I found her voice and tone in this short work very different than the tone of her more famous works. I imagine that is because there is more of the real Alcott in these sketches than in her longer novels.
March 10, 2019
Louisa May Alcott wrote this collection of sketches at the request of her friends and encouraged by her father. It was not a labor of love, and it shows. Allow me to clarify: The nursing was a labor of love while the writing of the sketches was not. The writing is uneven, moving from third-rate novelization to fair-to-good memior. The best part is the postcpscript.
The postscript is an open letter to a particular person and to all who have similar questions about the reality of nursing during the American Civil War. This seems to be the most nonfiction part of the book.
So why did I rate this book 3 Stars. I found some subtexts/experiences/descriptions to be interesting. And I recording/liking 2 quotes from the book.
The postscript is an open letter to a particular person and to all who have similar questions about the reality of nursing during the American Civil War. This seems to be the most nonfiction part of the book.
So why did I rate this book 3 Stars. I found some subtexts/experiences/descriptions to be interesting. And I recording/liking 2 quotes from the book.
March 20, 2019
“As no two persons see the same thing with the same eyes, my view of hospital life must be taken through my glass, and held for what it is worth.” ~LMA
I’ve never read anything by Louisa May Alcott before. That’s right. I have not read Little Women. I didn’t have any desire to. It isn’t really a story that appeals to me.
And I wouldn’t have read this one if I hadn’t joined in on a Traveling Book adventure through The Book Drunkard on Facebook. I discovered that I really like Alcott’s writing style, which is something that I would have never known otherwise.
Her descriptions in this book were vivid and poetic. She had a vast vocabulary and a delightfully creative way of expressing herself.
The book didn’t quite contain the depth I had hoped for but it was a quick, enjoyable read despite that. While I know some of her descriptions reflected the views of those times, I was taken aback but the occasional derogatory tone.
Because this is a traveling book and because I am near the tail end of its journey, I had the unique experience of seeing everyone else’s notes throughout the book, reflecting their takes on certain passages. That brought this book to life even more for me.
Now that I have sampled Alcott’s writing style, I think I may be interested in reading one of her other books, although her most famous work still isn’t calling out to me. She was an excellent writer with a quirky sense of humor and I am thankful for this particular reading experience.
I’ve never read anything by Louisa May Alcott before. That’s right. I have not read Little Women. I didn’t have any desire to. It isn’t really a story that appeals to me.
And I wouldn’t have read this one if I hadn’t joined in on a Traveling Book adventure through The Book Drunkard on Facebook. I discovered that I really like Alcott’s writing style, which is something that I would have never known otherwise.
Her descriptions in this book were vivid and poetic. She had a vast vocabulary and a delightfully creative way of expressing herself.
The book didn’t quite contain the depth I had hoped for but it was a quick, enjoyable read despite that. While I know some of her descriptions reflected the views of those times, I was taken aback but the occasional derogatory tone.
Because this is a traveling book and because I am near the tail end of its journey, I had the unique experience of seeing everyone else’s notes throughout the book, reflecting their takes on certain passages. That brought this book to life even more for me.
Now that I have sampled Alcott’s writing style, I think I may be interested in reading one of her other books, although her most famous work still isn’t calling out to me. She was an excellent writer with a quirky sense of humor and I am thankful for this particular reading experience.
September 16, 2023
Really interesting reading for a nurse like myself of Alcott's time as a volunteer Civil War nurse. She seems to have worked hard and been appreciated by patients and doctors. This was before she became well-known as the author of Little Women.
September 23, 2025
Thoughtful portrayal of the Civil War and hospital work. As is always the highlight in Alcott's work, two men kiss passionately at the end. Interesting depiction of DC's Georgetown neighborhood too. Extremely anti-confederate and discusses reparations throughout.
(QE)
(QE)
January 10, 2018
I sought this book out after revisiting Louisa May Alcott’s Eight Cousins And Rose in Bloom. I never got to read these books as a child but always wanted to! I saw that she had written Hospital Sketches, and me being a nurse and enjoy books in the Civil War Era I ordered it through the library. I found it interesting, a little confusing at times, but hey it was written in 1863😊
December 26, 2024
Consider this an endorsement to read more Louisa May Alcott beyond just little women!
July 29, 2016
Six weeks in a military hospital...
This is a short account of Louisa May Alcott's brief career as a nurse during the American Civil War. She only spent six weeks in the military hospital before falling ill with typhus and being persuaded by her father to come home, but during that time she saw first-hand some of the horrific injuries inflicted on the soldiers and the pretty basic and sub-standard care they got afterwards – in her hospital, at least, though she makes it clear there were other much more highly regarded hospitals at the time, too.
The first quarter of the book is taken up with her journey to the hospital in Washington. While mildly interesting in showing the difficulties of getting around during war-time, it does become somewhat tedious, mainly because of the tone she employs. Quite clearly, at that stage in her writing development Alcott had been reading a lot of Dickens, because not only does she refer to him on several occasions, but she adopts that kind of arch humour and tone of social superiority he employs from time to time, especially in his own factual writing. So, not content with giving herself the annoyingly twee pseudonym of Tribulation Periwinkle, she caricatures the people she meets and finds ways to mock them – their looks, their manners, the way they speak. I don't like it much when Dickens does it, and I wasn't any more keen on Alcott's version, especially since sometimes she doesn't quite manage to get the affectionate warmth into it that Dickens usually does.
Once she gets to the hospital, her tone changes for the most part, though she still tries to inject a little too much humour into it, I feel. But her observations on the way the hospital operated are quite insightful, and when she speaks of the suffering of the men, one feels her own voice comes through more clearly – that she becomes less conscious of herself as a writer and therefore more likeable as a human being. She doesn't dwell on scenes of gore, but rather on the emotional impact of their injuries on the men and, indeed, on herself. Occasionally she drifts into that peculiarly Victorian style of religious mawkishness (Dickens' influence again, I fear), and at one point regrets that she didn't give the men little sermons on a Sunday to set their minds on a higher path – an omission for which I expect the poor souls would have been profoundly grateful had they known. (It reminded me of a line from The Grapes of Wrath: “That's preachin'. Doin' good to a fella that's down an' can't smack ya in the puss for it.”)
A second generation Abolitionist, Alcott really shows, quite inadvertently, how ingrained the belief in racial superiority was at the time. Despite the fact that she was making a real sacrifice to support the cause of emancipation, when she speaks of the “colored people” her language and tone had me positively cringing. It's quite clear she sees them as inferior, almost sub-human, in every way, intellectually, culturally and even in physical appearance, and is rather nauseatingly self-congratulatory about her own condescension towards them. I did my very best to make allowances for the time and circumstances, but I found it hard going, and had the book not been so short, I doubt I'd have made it through.
The last section of the book tells of her own illness and how she went from nurse to being nursed. All in all, this is a very slight book, no more than novella length, and I would only recommend it as an interesting insight into Alcott herself, rather than as a particularly enjoyable or informative read in its own right. 2½ stars for me, so rounded up.
www.fictionfanblog.wordpress.com
This is a short account of Louisa May Alcott's brief career as a nurse during the American Civil War. She only spent six weeks in the military hospital before falling ill with typhus and being persuaded by her father to come home, but during that time she saw first-hand some of the horrific injuries inflicted on the soldiers and the pretty basic and sub-standard care they got afterwards – in her hospital, at least, though she makes it clear there were other much more highly regarded hospitals at the time, too.
The first quarter of the book is taken up with her journey to the hospital in Washington. While mildly interesting in showing the difficulties of getting around during war-time, it does become somewhat tedious, mainly because of the tone she employs. Quite clearly, at that stage in her writing development Alcott had been reading a lot of Dickens, because not only does she refer to him on several occasions, but she adopts that kind of arch humour and tone of social superiority he employs from time to time, especially in his own factual writing. So, not content with giving herself the annoyingly twee pseudonym of Tribulation Periwinkle, she caricatures the people she meets and finds ways to mock them – their looks, their manners, the way they speak. I don't like it much when Dickens does it, and I wasn't any more keen on Alcott's version, especially since sometimes she doesn't quite manage to get the affectionate warmth into it that Dickens usually does.
Once she gets to the hospital, her tone changes for the most part, though she still tries to inject a little too much humour into it, I feel. But her observations on the way the hospital operated are quite insightful, and when she speaks of the suffering of the men, one feels her own voice comes through more clearly – that she becomes less conscious of herself as a writer and therefore more likeable as a human being. She doesn't dwell on scenes of gore, but rather on the emotional impact of their injuries on the men and, indeed, on herself. Occasionally she drifts into that peculiarly Victorian style of religious mawkishness (Dickens' influence again, I fear), and at one point regrets that she didn't give the men little sermons on a Sunday to set their minds on a higher path – an omission for which I expect the poor souls would have been profoundly grateful had they known. (It reminded me of a line from The Grapes of Wrath: “That's preachin'. Doin' good to a fella that's down an' can't smack ya in the puss for it.”)
A second generation Abolitionist, Alcott really shows, quite inadvertently, how ingrained the belief in racial superiority was at the time. Despite the fact that she was making a real sacrifice to support the cause of emancipation, when she speaks of the “colored people” her language and tone had me positively cringing. It's quite clear she sees them as inferior, almost sub-human, in every way, intellectually, culturally and even in physical appearance, and is rather nauseatingly self-congratulatory about her own condescension towards them. I did my very best to make allowances for the time and circumstances, but I found it hard going, and had the book not been so short, I doubt I'd have made it through.
The last section of the book tells of her own illness and how she went from nurse to being nursed. All in all, this is a very slight book, no more than novella length, and I would only recommend it as an interesting insight into Alcott herself, rather than as a particularly enjoyable or informative read in its own right. 2½ stars for me, so rounded up.
www.fictionfanblog.wordpress.com
February 18, 2020
Short fiction written in first person. Adapted from Alcott's own notes and letters during her stint as a nurse in the Civil War. Alcott's voice holds true. At times charming and funny, at times beautifully poetic and almost other-worldly. A couple times in these short pages, I found myself reading and re-reading a passage. In the world of war stories, this is short and probably doesn't rank. But it was compelling nonetheless and I'm glad I read it and I'm glad I own a copy of it.
July 27, 2017
I started to read Noah Gordon's SHAMAN, and in Chapter I, he mentioned that the main character was reading "Hospital Sketches" during his train trip. Thanks to Project Gutenberg, I found the kindle copy of the book, and wanted to read it like some kind of late-afternoon intermezzo. But, I was slightly disappointed with the plot of this short essay-diary. First - the narrative tone is very grumpy in the biggest part of the book. It seems like that young narrator girl is on some crossroad of her life, and because of boredom, she decided to become a nurse - just like that. And soon after, she moved to the hospital that hired her. Considering that the Civil war is in progress, hospital is full of wounded soldiers from battle field who constantly die in dirt and bad hygiene, and narrator girlie constantly weep and preach about working conditions and about dirt and crowded space. Like she was sent thither by force, but not voluntarily. Very unprofessional. But, she brought that gloomy and tense atmosphere of the war-hospital very vivid. Especially in night time, which is considered as the hardest part of the day-cycle for severe ill or injured patients. The most informative part is the last chapter where she speaks about the interventions that she participated in, and about skills that she learned.
June 23, 2017
Hospital Sketches describes Alcott's sojourn (cut short due to illness) as a nurse in a Washington, D.C., hospital during the Civil War; it's witty in a rather Dickensian style (Alcott calls herself Tribulation Periwinkle, for example) and touching even though sentimental. I mostly enjoyed it, though I was bothered by Alcott's condescending attitude toward the black people for whose freedom she enthusiastically worked. Although she rejoices at the Emancipation Proclamation, she also clearly stereotypes blacks, as "obsequious, trickish, lazy, and ignorant, yet kind-hearted," and does not provide the kind of individual portrait she does for the white soldiers and doctors.
The edition I read is part of the Bedford Series in History and Culture, which are intended as teaching texts, and I thought the editor, Alice Fahs, did an excellent job in her introduction in placing the book in the context of its time, both literary and historical, and examining Alcott's racial attitudes.
The edition I read is part of the Bedford Series in History and Culture, which are intended as teaching texts, and I thought the editor, Alice Fahs, did an excellent job in her introduction in placing the book in the context of its time, both literary and historical, and examining Alcott's racial attitudes.
January 5, 2010
This was not what I expected but I enjoyed it a great deal. It is unfortunately too short (I knew Ms. Alcott went home after contracting Typhoid Fever, I didn't realize she became ill so quickly after her arrival). Considering she went to a new city, to learn a new job, on the eve of Fredericksburg, and remained less than 2 months, I find it rather impressive that she was able to capture what she did in her letters. I loved that the colloquial style was kept for the book. It's rough and informal but that provides a stronger feeling of "being there." It reminded at times of reading a blog.
The only books of hers I've read are the ones from the Little Women series. I really got a kick out of feeling like I was reading something written by Jo March as opposed to (based on my experience) Ms. Alcott. Enough where I'll probably tackle her journals at some point.
The only books of hers I've read are the ones from the Little Women series. I really got a kick out of feeling like I was reading something written by Jo March as opposed to (based on my experience) Ms. Alcott. Enough where I'll probably tackle her journals at some point.
November 22, 2025
Hospital Sketches is unique, a unicorn of a book. I do not know of any other nursing novel by a former Civil War nurse. Here Alcott tells of the experiences of a young woman, 30 years of age but regarding herself as a spinster, who enlists to serve as a nurse in Washington, DC. Tribulation Periwinkle is a nod to the Everyman figures as her name suggests, but she is fully rounded. Alcott herself served in exactly the same manner, so this is as much memoir as novella. Alcott loved to poke fun at herself, so I imagine fastening such a ridiculous to herself.
As readers of her other works might imagine the narrator is often wryly observant, as is the case in her description of her travel to DC from Massachusetts. I saw my own inability to keep up with my tickets and passport and bags on my recent trip to Lisbon as the constantly fumbling Trib did. In fact, much in the book is true to form in our supposedly more modern days of travel. The hoopla she encounters to get a particular pass again reminded me of the frustrations of travel paper work in our day. Her sizing up a plump passenger as a flotation device in case the ship should fail is drolly rendered. Once in DC, learning nursing on the job the book leans more philosophic. In some parts, she just avoids the bathic because her sincerity and actual experience inform her writing.
I do wonder if Hospital Sketches would appeal to many beyond the Alcott enchanted, but it is an excellent account of this painful episode in our history and of the women and men who served Democracy so well.
As readers of her other works might imagine the narrator is often wryly observant, as is the case in her description of her travel to DC from Massachusetts. I saw my own inability to keep up with my tickets and passport and bags on my recent trip to Lisbon as the constantly fumbling Trib did. In fact, much in the book is true to form in our supposedly more modern days of travel. The hoopla she encounters to get a particular pass again reminded me of the frustrations of travel paper work in our day. Her sizing up a plump passenger as a flotation device in case the ship should fail is drolly rendered. Once in DC, learning nursing on the job the book leans more philosophic. In some parts, she just avoids the bathic because her sincerity and actual experience inform her writing.
I do wonder if Hospital Sketches would appeal to many beyond the Alcott enchanted, but it is an excellent account of this painful episode in our history and of the women and men who served Democracy so well.
August 10, 2018
During the Civil War, Louisa May Alcott became a nurse. She did not stay long, catching Typhoid Fever and having to go home to recover. But the public was very interested in anything war related and so Louisa wrote "Hospital Sketches" which was fiction, but very based on her experiences. The story is short, roughly 85 pages.
There is something about Alcott's style. It is both easy to read and able to get involved in, but it can also feel infantile. I feel like she is trying to do everything in a cheerful and resolute manner. She even describes the death of a soldier without a depth of emotion. But I think she meant for there to be emotion. Maybe it was just the writing of the time or just my lack of connection, but I don't think it was very deep.
Also, Alcott is very into quoting other things. She is a true fan of literature and it reflects as she is quoting poems, Dickens, etc. Most of these references are now obscure and I was glad that my copy had footnotes to let me know what I was supposed to be appreciating.
There is something about Alcott's style. It is both easy to read and able to get involved in, but it can also feel infantile. I feel like she is trying to do everything in a cheerful and resolute manner. She even describes the death of a soldier without a depth of emotion. But I think she meant for there to be emotion. Maybe it was just the writing of the time or just my lack of connection, but I don't think it was very deep.
Also, Alcott is very into quoting other things. She is a true fan of literature and it reflects as she is quoting poems, Dickens, etc. Most of these references are now obscure and I was glad that my copy had footnotes to let me know what I was supposed to be appreciating.
September 5, 2011
Alcott's Hospital Sketches is, in the Bedford edition edited by Alice Fahs, a 6-chaptered memoir of Alcott's half a year spent nursing for the Union Army in Georgetown, outside DC, during the Civil War. I add the disclaimer because Fahs mentions in her introduction that the sixth "chapter" is actually a letter tacked on after the publication of the original five-chaptered Hospital Sketches. And it shows. I didn't shudder or cringe at anything Alcott wrote in those first five chapters even though one of them, "A Night," describes the slow, sentimental death of her beloved John. But in that final letter, the entire tone of the book changes from tragicomedy, dark and gritty, to the grotesque, all but describing the sounds arms make when they're being sawed off by a rougher-than-necessary Dr. P.
Chapter one, "Obtaining Supplies," covers how it is that Alcott made up her mind to (all but) join the Army as a nurse. It establishes a tone of playful cheeriness that pervades the novel? memoir? journal? -- especially in light of difficulties, such as all the gender-related obstacles she faces when trying to get a rail pass from Concord, MA, to Washington, DC, as well as all the other permissions a woman of her time needs to travel alone.
Chapter two, "A Forward Movement," recounts her trip to DC and then onto the hospital, which she dubs The Hurley-Burley House, with stops in New York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore along the way. Her first view of Washington, DC, "a spacious place, its visible magnitude quite took my breath away, and of course I quoted Randolph's expression, 'a city of magnificent distances,' as I suppose every one does when they see it," so squared with my own experience that, had I not been already endeared to LMA, she would have had me right there. We also see quite a bit more development of her alter ego, Tribulation Periwinkle, in this chapter, whom I believe LMA uses to call attention to the sentimental irony of her usually gendered or classed situations -- as well as to contribute to the sense that LMA is more aware of what's going on than a simple retelling would allow.
Chapter three, "A Day," takes us through a day-in-the-life of a quirky, intellectual, sarcastic Army "Nurse" -- and we begin to see just how loose a term that actually is, as the methods used in these hospitals seem so illogical and foreign to a germaphobe like me or any contemporary reader.
Chapter four, the most sentimental and, appropriately, dark chapter, is "A Night," in which she recalls the night that John dies. This chapter is fascinating for a number of reasons. It's the first time in the book that she actually addresses PTSD (though not called that at the time) outright in the fevers and reactions that soldiers relieving the war produces. It relies on the very dichotomy between woman and mother than the nineteenth century is so good at keeping separated in LMA's transformation from maternal caretaker to man-sensitive woman then back to maternal--even grandmotherly--caretaker. And it ends with two men kissing each other goodbye, "tenderly as women." Chock-full of intimacy, but Fahs contends that, when compared to other first-hand accounts of John's death, we find that LMA actually over-sentimentalizes the scene by adding the final goodbyes series and by playing up the homoeroticism of the final farewell between John and Ned.
Chapter five, "Off Duty," explains that LMA was relieved of her duty after contracting an illness that killed another woman working in her ward then details her return to her family home, but not before one last action scene wherein LMA rushes from room to room of the hospital in order to save a dying soldier's life (actually, it's a sardonic parody of the hospital's poor organization and implementation of care, a recurring theme in the narrative). It's remarkable, still, for its inclusion of LMA's brief encounter with a black family and the responses given by those around her to LMA's genuine concern for and acceptance of them. The chapter also details some of LMA's duties after she was no longer in contact with the bodies as well as what she enjoyed paying attention to now that her mind wasn't constantly occupied with wounds and dying.
The postscripted chapter, as I hinted at earlier, goes back through her time in a hurry but adds to it some gruesome details she left out in the first, original five chapters. I get the impression that she's been asked so much about those details that she felt compelled to, from the perspective of her alter ego Tribulation Periwinkle, tell the dirty underside of being a nurse... while also taking a backhanded stab at the way things were done at the Hurley-Burley House.
This was my first LMA reading, so I'm going to say only that I was surprised by the comedic tone she took up early on and maintained throughout. I'm also intrigued by the adoption of the alter ego, as though she required someone else to shift the responsibility to when things got gruesome or disgusting or plain ridiculous. Suggests to me a kind of splitting that she might have observed others doing, maybe her (then) larger-than-life father (whom she would come to overshadow in fame and fortune, as she details in the final letter). That's me psychoanalyzing LMA through her book, but if it's a memoir, I'm welcome to. Even if it's fiction, I can if I want. :)
Chapter one, "Obtaining Supplies," covers how it is that Alcott made up her mind to (all but) join the Army as a nurse. It establishes a tone of playful cheeriness that pervades the novel? memoir? journal? -- especially in light of difficulties, such as all the gender-related obstacles she faces when trying to get a rail pass from Concord, MA, to Washington, DC, as well as all the other permissions a woman of her time needs to travel alone.
Chapter two, "A Forward Movement," recounts her trip to DC and then onto the hospital, which she dubs The Hurley-Burley House, with stops in New York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore along the way. Her first view of Washington, DC, "a spacious place, its visible magnitude quite took my breath away, and of course I quoted Randolph's expression, 'a city of magnificent distances,' as I suppose every one does when they see it," so squared with my own experience that, had I not been already endeared to LMA, she would have had me right there. We also see quite a bit more development of her alter ego, Tribulation Periwinkle, in this chapter, whom I believe LMA uses to call attention to the sentimental irony of her usually gendered or classed situations -- as well as to contribute to the sense that LMA is more aware of what's going on than a simple retelling would allow.
Chapter three, "A Day," takes us through a day-in-the-life of a quirky, intellectual, sarcastic Army "Nurse" -- and we begin to see just how loose a term that actually is, as the methods used in these hospitals seem so illogical and foreign to a germaphobe like me or any contemporary reader.
Chapter four, the most sentimental and, appropriately, dark chapter, is "A Night," in which she recalls the night that John dies. This chapter is fascinating for a number of reasons. It's the first time in the book that she actually addresses PTSD (though not called that at the time) outright in the fevers and reactions that soldiers relieving the war produces. It relies on the very dichotomy between woman and mother than the nineteenth century is so good at keeping separated in LMA's transformation from maternal caretaker to man-sensitive woman then back to maternal--even grandmotherly--caretaker. And it ends with two men kissing each other goodbye, "tenderly as women." Chock-full of intimacy, but Fahs contends that, when compared to other first-hand accounts of John's death, we find that LMA actually over-sentimentalizes the scene by adding the final goodbyes series and by playing up the homoeroticism of the final farewell between John and Ned.
Chapter five, "Off Duty," explains that LMA was relieved of her duty after contracting an illness that killed another woman working in her ward then details her return to her family home, but not before one last action scene wherein LMA rushes from room to room of the hospital in order to save a dying soldier's life (actually, it's a sardonic parody of the hospital's poor organization and implementation of care, a recurring theme in the narrative). It's remarkable, still, for its inclusion of LMA's brief encounter with a black family and the responses given by those around her to LMA's genuine concern for and acceptance of them. The chapter also details some of LMA's duties after she was no longer in contact with the bodies as well as what she enjoyed paying attention to now that her mind wasn't constantly occupied with wounds and dying.
The postscripted chapter, as I hinted at earlier, goes back through her time in a hurry but adds to it some gruesome details she left out in the first, original five chapters. I get the impression that she's been asked so much about those details that she felt compelled to, from the perspective of her alter ego Tribulation Periwinkle, tell the dirty underside of being a nurse... while also taking a backhanded stab at the way things were done at the Hurley-Burley House.
This was my first LMA reading, so I'm going to say only that I was surprised by the comedic tone she took up early on and maintained throughout. I'm also intrigued by the adoption of the alter ego, as though she required someone else to shift the responsibility to when things got gruesome or disgusting or plain ridiculous. Suggests to me a kind of splitting that she might have observed others doing, maybe her (then) larger-than-life father (whom she would come to overshadow in fame and fortune, as she details in the final letter). That's me psychoanalyzing LMA through her book, but if it's a memoir, I'm welcome to. Even if it's fiction, I can if I want. :)
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