Part 5 (2/2)
One of the things here always on the go is long trains of army wagons--sometimes they will stream along all day; it almost seems as if there was nothing else but army wagons and ambulances. They have great camps here in every direction, of army wagons, teamsters, ambulance camps, etc.; some of them are permanent, and have small hospitals. I go to them (as no one else goes; ladies would not venture). I sometimes have the luck to give some of the drivers a great deal of comfort and help. Indeed, mother, there are camps here of everything--I went once or twice to the contraband camp, to the hospital, etc., but I could not bring myself to go again--when I meet black men or boys among my own hospitals, I use them kindly, give them something, etc.--I believe I told you that I do the same to the wounded Rebels, too--but as there is a limit to one's sinews and endurance and sympathies, etc., I have got in the way, after going lightly, as it were, all through the wards of a hospital, and trying to give a word of cheer, if nothing else, to every one, then confining my special attentions to the few where the investment seems to tell best, and who want it most. Mother, I have real pride in telling you that I have the consciousness of saving quite a number of lives by saving them from giving up--and being a good deal with them; the men say it is so, and the doctors say it is so--and I will candidly confess I can see it is true, though I say it of myself. I know you will like to hear it, mother, so I tell you.
I am finis.h.i.+ng this in Major Hapgood's office, about 1 o'clock--it is pretty warm, but has not cleared off yet. The trees look so well from where I am, and the Potomac--it is a n.o.ble river; I see it several miles, and the Arlington heights. Mother, I see some of the 47th Brooklyn every day or two; the reg't is on the heights back of Arlington house, a fine camp ground. O Matty, I have just thought of you--dear sister, how are you getting along? Jeff, I will write you truly. Good-bye for the present, dearest mother, and all.
WALT.
XXIII
_Was.h.i.+ngton, 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-cla.s.s 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 n.i.g.g.e.rs 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 Was.h.i.+ngton--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.
WALT.
XXIV
_Was.h.i.+ngton, Sept. 29, 1863._ DEAR MOTHER--Well, here I sit this forenoon in a corner by the window in Major Hapgood's office, all the Potomac, and Maryland, and Virginia hills in sight, writing my Tuesday letter to you, dearest mother. Major has gone home to Boston on sick leave, and only the clerk and me occupy the office, and he not much of the time. At the present moment there are two wounded officers come in to get their pay--one has crutches; the other is drest in the light-blue uniform of the invalid corps. Way up here on the 5th floor it is pretty hard scratching for cripples and very weak men to journey up here--often they come up here very weary and faint, and then find out they can't get their money, some red-tape hitch, and the poor soldiers look so disappointed--it always makes me feel bad.
Mother, we are having perfect weather here nowadays, both night and day.
The nights are wonderful; for the last three nights as I have walked home from the hospital pretty late, it has seemed to me like a dream, the moon and sky ahead of anything I ever see before. Mother, do you hear anything from George? I wrote to him yesterday and sent him your last letter, and Jeff's enclosed--I shall send him some papers to-day--I send him papers quite often. (Why hasn't Jeff sent me the _Union_ with my letter in? I want much to see it, and whether they have misprinted it.)
Mother, I don't think the 51st has been in any of the fighting we know of down there yet--what is to come of course n.o.body can tell. As to Burnside, I suppose you know he is among his _friends_, and I think this quite important, for such the main body of East Tennesseans are, and are far truer Americans anyhow than the Copperheads of the North. The Tennesseans will fight for us too. Mother, you have no idea how the soldiers, sick, etc. (I mean the American ones, to a man) all feel about the Copperheads; they never speak of them without a curse, and I hear them say, with an air that shows they mean it, they would shoot them sooner than they would a Rebel. Mother, the troops from Meade's army are pa.s.sing through here night and day, going West and so down to reinforce Rosecrans I suppose--the papers are not permitted to mention it, but it is so. Two Army Corps, I should think, have mostly pa.s.sed--they go through night and day--I hear the whistle of the locomotive screaming away any time at night when I wake up, and the rumbling of the trains.
Mother dear, you must write to me soon, and so must Jeff. I thought Mat was going to send me a great long letter--I am always looking for it; I hope it will be full of everything about family matters and doings, and how everybody really is. I go to Major's box three or four times a day. I want to hear also about Andrew, and indeed about every one of you and everything--nothing is too trifling, nothing uninteresting.
O mother, who do you think I got a letter from, two or three days ago?
Aunt f.a.n.n.y, Ansel's mother--she sent it by a young man, a wounded soldier who has been home to Farmingdale on furlough, and lately returned. She writes a first-rate letter, Quaker all over--I shall answer it. She says Mary and Ansel and all are well. I have received another letter from Mrs.
Price--she has not good health. I am sorry for her from my heart; she is a good, n.o.ble woman, no better kind. Mother, I am in the hospitals as usual--I stand it better the last three weeks than ever before--I go among the worst fevers and wounds with impunity. I go among the smallpox, etc., just the same--I feel to go without apprehension, and so I go. n.o.body else goes; and as the darkey said there at Charleston when the boat run on a flat and the Reb sharpshooters were peppering them, ”somebody must jump in de water and shove de boat off.”
WALT.
XXV
_Was.h.i.+ngton, Oct. 6, 1863._ DEAREST MOTHER--Your letter and George's came safe--dear brother George, one don't more than get a letter from him before you want to hear again, especially as things are looking pretty stormy that way--but mother, I rather lean to the opinion that the 51st is still in Kentucky, at or near where George last wrote; but of course that is only my guess. I send George papers and occasionally letters. Mother, I sent him enclosed your letter before the last, though you said in it not to tell him how much money he had home, as you wanted to surprise him; but I sent it. Mother, I think Rosecrans and Burnside will be too much for the Rebels down there yet. I myself make a great acc't of Burnside being in the midst of _friends_, and such friends too--they will fight and fight up to the handle, and kill somebody (it seems as if it was coming to that pa.s.s where we will either have to destroy or be destroyed). Mother, I wish you would write soon after you get this, or Jeff or Mat must, and tell me about Andrew, if there is anything different with him--I think about him every day and night. I believe I must come home, even if it is only for a week--I want to see you all very much. Mother, I know you must have a great deal to hara.s.s and trouble you; I don't mean about Andrew personally, for I know you would feel to give your life to save his, and do anything to nourish him, but about the children and Nancy--but, mother, you must not let anything chafe you, and you must not be squeamish about saying firmly at times not to have little Georgy too much to trouble you (poor little fellow, I have no doubt he will be a pleasanter child when he grows older); and while you are pleasant with Nancy you must be sufficiently plain with her--only, mother, I know you will, and Jeff and Mat will too, be invariably good to Andrew, and not mind his being irritable at times; it is his disease, and then his temper is naturally fretful, but it is such a misfortune to have such sickness--and always do anything for him that you can in reason. Mat, my dear sister, I know you will, for I know your nature is to come out a first-cla.s.s girl in times of trouble and sickness, and do anything. Mother, you don't know how pleased I was to read what you wrote about little Sis. I want to see her so bad I don't know what to do; I know she must be just the best young one on Long Island--but I hope it will not be understood as meaning any slight or disrespect to Miss Hat, nor to put her nose out of joint, because Uncle Walt, I hope, has heart and gizzard big enough for both his little nieces and as many more as the Lord may send.
Mother, I am writing this in Major Hapgood's office, as usual. I am all alone to-day--Major is still absent, unwell, and the clerk is away somewhere. O how pleasant it is here--the weather I mean--and other things too, for that matter. I still occupy my little room, 394 L st.; get my own breakfast there; had good tea this morning, and some nice biscuit (yesterday morning and day before had peaches cut up). My friends the O'Connors that I wrote about recommenced cooking the 1st of this month (they have been, as usual in summer, taking their meals at a family hotel near by). Sat.u.r.day they sent for me to breakfast, and Sunday I eat dinner with them--very good dinner, roast beef, lima beans, good potatoes, etc.
They are truly friends to me. I still get my dinner at a restaurant usually. I have a very good plain dinner, which is the only meal of any account I make during the day; but it is just as well, for I would be in danger of getting fat on the least encouragement, and I have no ambition that way. Mother, it is lucky I like Was.h.i.+ngton in many respects, and that things are upon the whole pleasant personally, for every day of my life I see enough to make one's heart ache with sympathy and anguish here in the hospitals, and I do not know as I could stand it if it was not counterbalanced outside. It is curious, when I am present at the most appalling things--deaths, operations, sickening wounds (perhaps full of maggots)--I do not fail, although my sympathies are very much excited, but keep singularly cool; but often hours afterward, perhaps when I am home or out walking alone, I feel sick and actually tremble when I recall the thing and have it in my mind again before me. Mother, did you see my letter in the N. Y. _Times_ of Sunday, Oct. 4? That was the long-delayed letter. Mother, I am very sorry Jeff did not send me the _Union_ with my letter in--I wish very much he could do so yet; and always when I have a letter in a paper I would like to have one sent. If you take the _Union_, send me some once in a while. Mother, was it Will Brown sent me those?
Tell him if so I was much obliged; and if he or Mr. and Mrs. Brown take any interest in hearing my scribblings, mother, you let them read the letters, of course. O, I must not close without telling you the highly important intelligence that I have cut my hair and beard--since the event Rosecrans, Charleston, etc., etc., have among my acquaintances been hardly mentioned, being insignificant themes in comparison. Jeff, my dearest brother, I have been going to write you a good gossipy letter for two or three weeks past; will try to yet, so it will reach you for Sunday reading--so good-bye, Jeff, and good-bye for present, mother dear, and all, and tell Andrew he must not be discouraged yet.
WALT.
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