Confederacy, "Kittrells Nc, 15 Aug", manuscript postmark tied by 1863, 10¢ blue, huge margins all around, on small homemade cover addressed to Miss Sallie Tompkins, Care Dr. A.Y.P. Garnett, Robertson Hospital, Richmond Va.; no flap, Very Fine, ex-Brian Green, Hambrecht. Scott No. 12  Estimate $400 - 600. Sally Louisa Tompkins was from a wealthy family and resided in Richmond at the beginning of the war. She opened Robertson Hospital, a private hospital, to care for Confederate wounded. The hospital was named for Judge John Robertson who donated the home. Thompson operated the hospital at her own expense, not closing until the last wounded patients were discharged in June 1865. They cared for over 1,300 patients, of whom only 73 died. No other hospital saved more of its patients, and officers tried to place their most seriously wounded in their care. It was Tompkin's success rate that allowed her private facility to stay open after Sept. 1861, when President Davis ordered all private hospitals closed. To allow Robertson Hospital to remain open, Davis commissioned Tompkins an unassigned Captain in the Confederate cavalry. She was the only woman to hold a commission in the Confederate Army. Dr. Alexander Yelverton Peyton Garnett was a Surgeon at the Robertson Hospital as well as serving Gen. Robert E. Lee and his family during the War and the families of many other Confederate Generals, and members of Government.References: Subject of a Brian Green article in the July 1969 Confederate Philatelist and featured in Terry Hambrecht's article in the March-April 1987 issue on page 11. $0 (Image)