The nurses of the Civil War ushered in a new era for medicine in the midst of tremendous hardship. While the country was at war, these women learned to advocate and care for patients in hostile settings, saved countless lives, and changed the profession forever. They regularly fell ill with no one to nurse them in return, seethed in anger at the indifference and inefficiency that left wounded men on the battlefield without care, and all too often mourned for those they could not rescue. HEROINES OF MERCY STREET tells the true stories of the nurses at Mansion House, the Alexandria, Virginia, hotel turned wartime hospital, and the setting for the PBS show MERCY STREET.
