WASHINGTON, D.C..- In commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the beginning of the Civil War, the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History opened a special display titled “‘So Much Need of Service’—The Diary of a Civil War Nurse,” telling the story of Civil War nurse Amanda Akin. On loan from the National Library of Medicine, the display includes Akin’s personal diary and the published account of her experience as a nurse in the book, The Lady Nurse of Ward E. “So Much Need of Service” is on view in the Albert H. Small Documents Gallery April 22 until July 31. The exhibit has a companion website and a mobile map application for visitors to find Civil War sites in Washington, D.C. In April 1863, Akin traveled from her home in Quaker Hill, N.Y., to serv