Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1898-07-28
FROM CHICKA.MAUGA.
A Wheeling Soldier Writes an Inter
esting Letter to Cousin.

The following letter from Harry w.
Rogers, Wheeling boy who is MEM
Der of Company M, First West Virginia
regiment, at Chickamauga, has been
received by his cousin here:
Camp Thomas,
Chickamauga Park, Ga, July 10.
Dear Little Cousin Lula:-Your letter
reached me some days ago, and l have
not had time to answer it sooner. We
are so busy getting ready to go-I don't
know where-one day to Cuba, next
order to Canary Islands, next to Porto
Rico and next home, SO we will not be
able to tell much about it until we are
ready to go. l want to go to the Can
aries, but I don't expect l will get to
go. 1 have been disappointed so much.
| am Just in from sentinel duty and am
about worn out. Have to walk our
post for two hours without sitting
down, numbered with a coat and sar
fridge belt and exposed to the swell
tering rays of "Old Sol.' Lula, just
think Of packing the old musket from
the house to the stable and from the
stable to the house for two hours, and
not allowed to shift it from your right
shoulder besides Our guns have bayo-
than Uncle Recess old musket, and,
oh, my, they kick like a government
mule Oh, | want to be sojer boy, a
sojer boy so brave-"nit." One for
tunate thing for me is | don't get home
sick, and that is what bothers the
boys worse than anything else.
The Park has been condemned, for
we have 1,400 cases of fever (more or
l. Il
| am not afraid Of either. All I'm
afraid of is that little friend and con-
traband of war that travels over ones
corporal system at very remarkable
speed and pitches his tent in the seams
of your clothes We have them; they
like the place and have come to stay.
| haven't any myself, but know where
| can get some very cheap. Lula.
wish you could see us at mess or wash
in gour clothes. No, wouldn't want
YOU to see us washing our clothes,
either. for most of us are in nude at
tire sitting on a rock in the middle
of the river beside a dashboard with
our clothes tied arOun us. When
they are washed we hang them on the
line, i. e.: put them on, and run until
they are dry And in case the clothes
line should break. ie.: we fall down,
why, we just wash them again.
Some Of the boys are pale and silent,
some hilarious, and some writing let
tiers. I haven't seen any of them pray
ing yet, but | did see some most des
perate characters at church with long
faces on. The pine I sent you is from
Lookout Mountain, the leaf is from
Missionary Ridge, and the bark is from
the banks Of the Tennessee river. If
1t were not for the intolerable flies and
heat, and the presence of those other
armed cruisers, heretofore spoken Of
some might become poetical, and behold
old Lookout Mountain rousing from a
reverie and frowning down in majesty
as though the sight of soldiers recalled
the horrid butchery of '63; or fancy
that the waters of the Tennessee.
spread in winding solemnity, We're
catching the spirit they held in the
years when they fioated the armored
| engineers of death. or were beat into
foam by a thousand war horses The
suggestive designs in granite and
bronze that mark the spots where
heroes died. too. send over one a SOL
emn awe Even the name of our camp
| is a lurid treasure of bloody years; but
one should not brood. Trust no flu
| ture. howeer pleasant: Let the dead
past bury its dead: Act in the living
present; Heart within and God Ger
head"
Give my love to the boys and girls,
Your cousin