_Washington, Sept. 15, 1863._ DEAR MOTHER--Your letters were very
acceptable--one came just as I was putting my last in the post office--I
guess they all come right. I have written to Han and George and sent
George papers. Mother, have you heard anything whether the 51st went on
with Burnside, or did they remain as a reserve in Kentucky? Burnside has
managed splendidly so far, his taking Knoxville and all together--it is a
first-class success. I have known Tennessee Union men here in hospital,
and I understand it, therefore--the region where Knoxville is is mainly
Union, but the Southerners could not exist without it, as it is in their
midst, so they determined to pound and kill and crush out the
Unionists--all the savage and monstrous things printed in the papers about
their treatment are true, at least that kind of thing is, as bad as the
Irish in the mob treated the poor niggers in New York. We North don't
understand some things about Southerners; it is very strange, the
contrast--if I should pick out the most genuine Union men and real
patriots I have ever met in all my experience, I should pick out two or
three Tennessee and Virginia Unionists I have met in the hospitals,
wounded or sick. One young man I guess I have mentioned to you in my
letters, John Barker, 2nd Tennessee Vol. (Union), was a long while a
prisoner in Secesh prisons in Georgia, and in Richmond--three times the
devils hung him up by the heels to make him promise to give up his
Unionism; once he was cut down for dead. He is a young married man with
one child. His little property destroyed, his wife and child turned
out--he hunted and tormented--and any moment he could have had anything if
he would join the Confederacy--but he was firm as a rock; he would not
even take an oath to not fight for either side. They held him about eight
months--then he was very sick, scurvy, and they exchanged him and he came
up from Richmond here to hospital; here I got acquainted with him. He is a
large, slow, good-natured man, somehow made me often think of father;
shrewd, very little to say--wouldn't talk to anybody but me. His whole
thought was to get back and fight; he was not fit to go, but he has gone
back to Tennessee. He spent two days with his wife and young one there,
and then to his regiment--he writes to me frequently and I to him; he is
not fit to soldier, for the Rebels have destroyed his health and strength
(though he is only 23 or 4), but nothing will keep him from his regiment,
and fighting--he is uneducated, but as sensible a young man as I ever met,
and understands the whole question. Well, mother, Jack Barker is the most
genuine Union man I have ever yet met. I asked him once very gravely why
he didn't take the Southern oath and get his liberty--if he didn't think
he was foolish to be so stiff, etc. I never saw such a look as he gave me,
he thought I was in earnest--the old devil himself couldn't have had put a
worse look in his eyes. Mother, I have no doubt there are quite a good
many just such men. He is down there with his regiment (one of his
brothers was killed)--when he fails in strength he gets the colonel to
detach him to do teamster's duty for a few days, on a march till he
recruits his strength--but he always carries his gun with him--in a battle
he is always in the ranks--then he is so sensible, such decent manly ways,
nothing shallow or mean (he must have been a giant in health, but now he
is weaker, has a cough too). Mother, can you wonder at my getting so
attached to such men, with such love, especially when they show it to
me--some of them on their dying beds, and in the very hour of death, or
just the same when they recover, or partially recover? I never knew what
American young men were till I have been in the hospitals. Well, mother, I
have got writing on--there is nothing new with me, just the same old
thing, as I suppose it is with you there. Mother, how is Andrew? I wish to
hear all about him--I do hope he is better, and that it will not prove
anything so bad. I will write to him soon myself, but in the meantime you
must tell him to not put so much faith in medicine--drugs, I mean--as in
the true curative things; namely, diet and careful habits, breathing good
air, etc. You know I wrote in a former letter what is the cause and
foundation of the diseases of the throat and what must be the remedy that
goes to the bottom of the thing--sudden attacks are to be treated with
applications and medicines, but diseases of a seated character are not to
be cured by them, only perhaps a little relieved (and often aggravated,
made firmer).
Dearest mother, I hope you yourself are well, and getting along good.
About the letter in the _Times_, I see ever since I sent they have been
very crowded with news that must be printed--I think they will give it
yet. I hear there is a new paper in Brooklyn, or to be one--I wish Jeff
would send me some of the first numbers without fail, and a stray _Eagle_
in same parcel to make up the 4 ounces. I am glad to hear Mat was going to
write me a good long letter--every letter from home is so good, when one
is away (I often see the men crying in the hospital when they get a
letter). Jeff too, I want him to write whenever he can, and not forget the
new paper. We are having pleasant weather here; it is such a relief from
that awful heat (I can't think of another such siege without feeling sick
at the thought).
Mother, I believe I told you I had written to Mrs. Price--do you see Emma?
Are the soldiers still on Fort Greene? Well, mother, I have writ quite a
letter--it is between 2 and 3 o'clock--I am in Major Hapgood's all
alone--from my window I see all the Potomac, and all around
Washington--Major and all gone down to the army to pay troops, and I keep
house. I am invited to dinner to-day at 4 o'clock at a Mr. Boyle's--I am
going (hope we shall have something good). Dear mother, I send you my
love, and some to Jeff and Mat and all, not forgetting Mannahatta (who I
hope is a help and comfort to her grandmother). Well, I must scratch off
in a hurry, for it is nearly an hour [later] than I thought. Good-bye for
the present, dear mother.