Massachusetts Military State Agency (Washington, D.C.)

The Massachusetts Military State Agency in Washington, D.C., established in 1862 and headed by Gardiner Tufts, served as a charitable and relief organization for Massachusetts soldiers during the Civil War, along with similar agencies in four other Atlantic seaboard transport centers. Its duties included the visiting of hospitals to ascertain the condition of soldiers and providing them with necessary supplies; acting for claimants of back-pay, bounties, and pensions; arranging for the interment or return to Massachusetts of the bodies of deceased soldiers; and providing information to soldiers' families about their condition and whereabouts. After the war, the agency continued its work with pension and bounty claims, in Washington until 1870, then in Boston until 1879, when its functions were transferred from the state surgeon general to the state adjutant general.