Contributions.--
Dear Sir:
Enclosed you will find a check of the Bank of Charleston, S. C., on the Farmers' Bank of Richmond for four thousand dollars, payable to your order.
Some time after its date (29th August, 1861.) I read in the Richmond Dispatch the appeal to the South in behalf of the St. Charles Hotel Hospital. It was brought to the attention of the Executive Committee of the Aid and Relief Association in Charleston. We were then first apprised, and were made sensible of the claims of gratitude which your generous provision and care for so many sick and suffering volunteers from South Carolina had laid upon the citizens of that State. A committee charged with the subject waited upon Gov. Pickens. He desired that a committee of the Association, visiting Richmond on other business, should make inquiries respecting your hospital, and report the result to him. The detention of the committee in Richmond concurred, with the absence of the Governor from Charleston when they returned, to delay action until this time. It is sufficient for me to say that on the report of the Committee the Governor made prompt and cheerful response to your appeal by a check for the amount which I have the satisfaction to remit.
That Governor Pickens may not seem to have been inattentive to the wants of the South Carolina Volunteers, it may be proper to state that with provident care he furnished four thousand dollars to the first two regiments which went to Virginia; and afterwards deposited twenty thousand dollars in one of the banks of Richmond, subject to the draft of the senior colonel from this State, for the supply of comforts and necessaries for them. A very small part of this latter sum has been expended; and it has been recommended by the Governor to appropriate it for the establishment and support of army hospitals for the South Carolina Volunteers in every field of service.
I would do injustice to the people of South Carolina if I did not take this occasion to express their profound admiration and gratitude for the generous profusion of the citizens of Virginia in providing for the sick and wounded soldiers in that State, as well in numerous and well appointed private hospitals, as by the reception and tender care and nursing of them in so many private families in Richmond, and every where else within reach of the encampments. The memory of all that you have done will long abide in the hearts of the people of South Carolina, and bind them to the citizens of Virginia by the strongest ties of esteem and gratitude,
Your obedient servant.
Edward frost, Chairman of the Executive Committee of the "Aid and Relief association."
