I
_Washington, Monday forenoon, Dec. 29, 1862._ DEAR, DEAR MOTHER--Friday
the 19th inst. I succeeded in reaching the camp of the 51st New York, and
found George[1] alive and well. In order to make sure that you would get
the good news, I sent back by messenger to Washington a telegraphic
dispatch (I dare say you did not get it for some time) as well as a
letter--and the same to Hannah[2] at Burlington. I have staid in camp with
George ever since, till yesterday, when I came back to Washington, about
the 24th. George got Jeff's[3] letter of the 20th. Mother, how much you
must have suffered, all that week, till George's letter came--and all the
rest must too. As to me, I know I put in about three days of the greatest
suffering I ever experienced in my life. I wrote to Jeff how I had my
pocket picked in a jam and hurry, changing cars, at Philadelphia--so that
I landed here without a dime. The next two days I spent hunting through
the hospitals, walking day and night, unable to ride, trying to get
information--trying to get access to big people, etc.--I could not get
the least clue to anything. Odell would not see me at all. But Thursday
afternoon, I lit on a way to get down on the Government boat that runs to
Aquia creek, and so by railroad to the neighborhood of Falmouth, opposite
Fredericksburg--so by degrees I worked my way to Ferrero's[4] brigade,
which I found Friday afternoon without much trouble after I got in camp.
When I found dear brother George, and found that he was alive and well, O
you may imagine how trifling all my little cares and difficulties
seemed--they vanished into nothing. And now that I have lived for eight or
nine days amid such scenes as the camps furnish, and had a practical part
in it all, and realize the way that hundreds of thousands of good men are
now living, and have had to live for a year or more, not only without any
of the comforts, but with death and sickness and hard marching and hard
fighting (and no success at that) for their continual experience--really
nothing we call trouble seems worth talking about. One of the first things
that met my eyes in camp was a heap of feet, arms, legs, etc., under a
tree in front of a hospital, the Lacy house.
George is very well in health, has a good appetite--I think he is at times
more wearied out and homesick than he shows, but stands it upon the whole
very well. Every one of the soldiers, to a man, wants to get home.
I suppose Jeff got quite a long letter I wrote, from camp, about a week
ago. I told you that George had been promoted to captain--his commission
arrived while I was there. When you write, address, Capt. George W.
Whitman, Co. K., 51st New York Volunteers, Ferrero's brigade, near
Falmouth, Va. Jeff must write oftener, and put in a few lines from mother,
even if it is only two lines--then in the next letter a few lines from
Mat, and so on. You have no idea how letters from home cheer one up in
camp, and dissipate homesickness.
While I was there George still lived in Capt. Francis's tent--there were
five of us altogether, to eat, sleep, write, etc., in a space twelve feet
square, but we got along very well--the weather all along was very
fine--and would have got along to perfection, but Capt. Francis is not a
man I could like much--I had very little to say to him. George is about
building a place, half hut and half tent, for himself, (he is probably
about it this very day,) and then he will be better off, I think. Every
captain has a tent, in which he lives, transacts company business, etc.,
has a cook, (or a man of all work,) and in the same tent mess and sleep
his lieutenants, and perhaps the first sergeant. They have a kind of
fire-place--and the cook's fire is outside on the open ground. George had
very good times while Francis was away--the cook, a young disabled
soldier, Tom, is an excellent fellow and a first-rate cook, and the second
lieutenant, Pooley, is a tip-top young Pennsylvanian. Tom thinks all the
world of George; when he heard he was wounded, on the day of the battle,
he left everything, got across the river, and went hunting for George
through the field, through thick and thin. I wrote to Jeff that George was
wounded by a shell, a gash in the cheek--you could stick a splint through
into the mouth, but it has healed up without difficulty already.
Everything is uncertain about the army, whether it moves or stays where it
is. There are no furloughs granted at present. I will stay here for the
present, at any rate long enough to see if I can get any employment at
anything, and shall write what luck I have. Of course I am unsettled at
present. Dear mother; my love.