ABSTRACT
When McClellan made his long delayed move against Richmond in a sea expedition south to the “peninsula” of Virginia, Frederick Olmsted threw aside his alternatives and plunged himself and the commission into the new effort. He gave up the desk work in Washington which had consumed his time for almost a year and left the national guidance of the organization to subordinates in the capital, to agents stationed elsewhere, and to the execu tive committee in New York City. Under Olmsteds direct command, the Sanitary Commission played a central part in this campaign in succoring the sick and wounded of the federal forces-and sometimes of the Confederates captured. W hile individual members of the Army Medical Bureau in the field were often brave, industrious, and inventive, the entire official effort was inadequate. On the Peninsula, the Sanitary Commission, a private, voluntary organization, supplemented, and in some circumstances, took the entire place of the Army Medical Bureau. In this effort the commission, therefore, fulfilled its conceived function; it gave aid where aid was needed, and it indicated to the Medical Bureau what its proper function should be.
