The civil war took everything from her. Tennessee had been gutted by the war with major skirmishes wreaking havoc all over the land. Daisy could still remember how the Mississippi had run red with blood after the bombardment of Fort Sumter. Sometimes, she would wake in the middle of the night, covered in sweat because her nightmares had reminded her of the horrors she had seen. Severed limbs. Split skulls. Guts spilling to the ground. She had tried to stay away from trouble but everywhere she went, destruction followed. First, it was a fire that burned down her childhood home, a plantation that had belonged to her family for well over a century. Then, her lodging home was plagued with a typhoid epidemic, forcing her to flee elsewhere.

That very night, she wrote in a response to one of the ads and prayed for a miracle. She wasn't sure whether God would heed her call or not. She was growing accustomed to her pleas falling on deaf ears.