The Day The War Stopped In Kentucky

Sister Mary Lucy was born Barbara Dosh in Pennsylvania. She and her sister were orphans who were taken in by the Sisters of Nazareth of Louisville. Barbara had a talent for singing, so the nuns sent her to study music at St. Vincent’s near Waverly, in Union County. A wealthy couple wanted to adopt her, but she so loved the Sisters of Nazareth that she became a nun and was known henceforth as Sister Mary Lucy.

When the Civil War broke out in 1861, Sister Mary Lucy was teaching music at St. Mary's Academy in Paducah Kentucky. Northern troops occupied the Southern-sympathizing town in September, and appealed to the sisters at St. Mary’s to help nurse the sick and wounded. Though teachers, the nuns from St. Mary’s did double duty as nurses. The Sisters served in all the hospitals which were soon filled with cases of typhoid and other infectious diseases and later with sick and wounded from the battlefields. Some patients were captured Confederates but the nuns treated all of the patients the same.

Sister Mary Lucy was young, and unproven as a nurse. But she willingly went about the task assigned to her; tasks which required every ounce of courage and strength that she had. She sang softly in her beautiful voice as she worked, for which the soldiers silently blessed her, as it reminded them of their mothers, wives, and sweethearts back home. Sister Mary Lucy also ate less food so the patients could have more. This apparently weakened her system, and she came down with typhoid fever. Sister Mary Lucy died on Dec. 29, 1861.

Even battle-hardened soldiers were heartbroken at the death of this selfless young nun. She had never raised a hand against anybody, and here she was struck down by this horrible disease. Union authorities arranged a military funeral. Her honor guard was a dozen officers, six in blue and six in gray. All were patients of Sister Mary Lucy. Her coffin was placed aboard the Peacock, the cannon-bristling gunboat draped in black. The warship transported Sister Mary Lucy’s remains up the Ohio River to Uniontown, where a wagon waited to take the coffin to the little cemetery at St. Vincent's Academy.

The soldiers were convalescent at best, in their weakened state; they risked catching pneumonia in the cold out on the river.

It was dark when the Peacock reached Uniontown. They put torches on the wagon and the funeral procession traveled another seven miles down a dirt road to the cemetery. After a brief funeral service, her body was laid to rest. Before they left, the officers, with the permission of the church, gave her a military salute. After the burial services were over, the twelve officers of two different armies parted company, one contingent going to Columbus, Kentucky in the service of the North, the other group toward Vicksburg and the South. Impressed as they were by the admirable conduct and gallantry shown by the Southerners on the journey, the Federal officers allowed the Southern officers their freedom and in that act offered a tribute to the memory of Sister Mary Lucy, who had nursed all men as simple children of God, regardless of the earthly loyalties.

Location: Kentucky Paducah