Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1863-05-21
Letter from the 18th Regiment
Correspondence OF the Belmont Chronicle
CAMP DRAKE. MURFREEsDoRo,
TENN Nav yih Inca

you for long time, for the very good ant
sufficient reason that there has nothint
turned up" within the 18th lately out o
which my skill could possibly get up "a 10
cal " Of sufficient importance to make a let
ter of it. ....
We are still at Murfreesboro', doing .
large amount of outpost duty, and that i,
all We are pleasantly encamped in sigh
of the town and Railroad, have plenty I,
eat, plenty Of clothes, and all things neces
ssry TO make the physical man comfortable
As to future movements, and the intention,
of odd Rosy" although Special Cores
pondents" Of city dailies may know some
thing, we here in the 18th know nothing
The health Of our regiment was neve,
better, and we have now here for duty thre,
hundred men. Three hundred who have
been for twenty months in the front doipp
picket duty-making reconnoissances into
the enemy's country, and who have become
familiar with the habits of rebels three
hundred men who cun tell "Butternut
sign" as readily as the hunter can the sirr
of his game three hundred men who have
been tried in the fire of two great battle.
We feel that these men know it all -
know how to live in the woods and open
fields, and make themselves comfortable
where they would have suffered greatly
twenty months ago. They know how to
make a good wholesome meal out Of what
they could not have lived upon when they
first came into the service. Col. Laribee,
Of the oath Wisconsin, (who, by the way,
is brick) was present few evenings ago
at the presentation of sword to Col. Glib
son by the 10th Ohio, and in the course of
his remarks asked how long the 49th had
been in the service. He was answered
twenty months. Twenty months, " said
the Colonel; well, what you don't know
there is 10 use in any one trying to find out. I"
So we think. Twenty months in the front
will make soldier of any man who has
any of the material of man about him. -
And just here, We think, is the best school
in America for making soldier; for making
them good and .Jast Our authorities should
send the conscrpts here at once. There will
be no trouble keeping them in camp here !;
no breaking guard, as in the States. Send
them here, by all means. The 18th can
accommodate about four hundred of them,
and we are anxious to have them among us.
As to their patriotism, little following Of
the old flag over few dusty marches a
lew nights on picket guarding it; few
skirmishes in defense of it, would give them
an atfe ction for the Star Spangled Banner
that We much fear some of our neighbors
in tho North do not have at present.
This is a beautiful country around Muir.
freesboro'. Sweet little wood embowered
cottages" around the outskirts of the town;
stately mansions on splendid plantations as
you get further into tie country; whilst the
town itself has been model of beauty and
Southern aristocracy. But the invader" ,"
as they term US is among them, and the
cottage, splendid mansion, and aristocratic
dwellings, are generally left to the care of
negroes, or occupied as hospitals or head
quarters; the town one vast commissary
department. Not a vestage of the former
beauty aud glory of the town remains, save
where the green livery OF nature" has
been kindly thrown over the grim visage of
war. For miles around Murfreesboro' there
has been no crop put in, indeed. it was i'm
possible from the fact that there is not q
sign of fence within reach OF the place.
The people here, ut the commencement of
this outbreak, were all rebels, and it is a
proper county to be desolated--and it has
been, The people here have felt the heavy
hand OF that gian. they reused when they
triticd with aud outraged the forbearance
and long suffering Of the North. This war
can be ended by making the entire South
desoiatlon such AS now reigns around Mur-
ireesboro. 1t can be done. 1t may take
years; still we can desolate the entire South.
Let President Lincoln send out another
swarm from his Northern hive this Sum-
mer; and let it be continued; let swarm
after swarm come, until the whole land is
desolation as complete as soldiers know how
to make it; or until the supremacy of our
laws and our institutions are acknowledged
upon every foot Of Southern soil The
North is safe from INVASION Our homes
will never fee the cruel power of an in
vader, The North can carry on this war
for twenty years to bring it to q successful
termination, and if we ever have peace at
home, if we have law and order in the
North hereafter, this rebellion must be
crushed, and the soldiers go homo in tri-
umph. They will never consent to 20 home
,ohipped, and be at peace with the men in
the North who are aiding and encouraging
this rebellion by every means in their power
save by the ''oreT act that would endan
ger their cowardly necks. Ii we 20 home
without accomplishing the great Object for
which we came into the army, "the restosa-
tion of the Union" then by the living God
there will be eternal hostility between the
Butternuts and soldiers l have heard it
sworn around many camp fire BY men who
meant 1t, it rebellion is to triumph in this
fair land, and our glorious old, Ship Of State
go down in this sea of domestic trouble,
then between the synpathizers with the
and tho soldiers of the Union
there will be no Constitutions, or laws; if
all that we have been taught to reverence
and love is lost, then the heaviest hand and
the best muscle will reign for awhile in
Warsaw. sa3l -'-.'
merely throw these out as hints for the
wise. am writing just at the time when
the news seems to look as though Hooker
l. l. q. IL x.l ID i Y