Phebe May, Civil War Nurse

Phebe Aggett May, was 31 years old when she accompanied her newly commissioned husband, Dr. Henry C. May, to work in the army hospitals of Baltimore in 1862. In May 1863 he was ordered to the York, Pennsylvania, hospital for two months until ordered to the front with the 12th Corps during the battle of Gettysburg. She joined him from Washington, D.C., traveling through Baltimore to secure military permission to proceed to Gettysburg along with Dorothea Dix on July 11th. 

At Gettysburg, she worked tirelessly alongside her husband in the field hospital of the 12th Corps until it closed, and then at Camp Letterman General Hospital until November.  Dr. May was then ordered to the hospitals in Nashville where they both served until returning home to Corning, New York, after the war.  

In addition to nursing, Phebe was appointed as NY State Agent by Governors Lyman and Fenton and distributed funds on their behalf while in Nashville.  She recalled her work during those eventful years as “one of pure love for our country’s cause.”