Year: 1871

My DEAR Miss P.--I hope you will
have the patience to listen to long story,
or rather to read long letter. will
be as brief as possible. Bat condense as
may, am obliged to give you long
letter. l enclose you the photographs of
myself and daughter. Please look at the
sweet young face of my daughter. You
left her an infant almost. She is now in
her fourteenth year. 1t is in her behalf
that l am now writing to you, as will
soon appear. To begin with when you
left us in 81. The war had then begun,
that cruel war that devastated our whole
country, but especially Virginia. Her
Scared bosom was the bloody battle field
of so many battles. And alas, her soil
entombs so many of her gallant sons.
This immediate neighborhood felt the
war very heavily. There was not fam
lily left but wore the sable hues of mourn
ing When the war commenced | had n
husband and six brothers. 1t closed and
my husband and three of my brothers
were gone, and of my three brothers left,
one is a cripple for life. My family
the SIS (my maiden name was S.
we're bitterly opposed to secession, and voted
against it to the last, obtaining thereby
much obloquy from their secesh neigh
bors. They talked at one time of hang
ing my brother, DR.. s., for his Union
principles. You remember DR.. s., do
you not He lived just the other side of
the river. My husband was never in the
army as soldier. He died 18th of Ju-
ly, 90, Of fever contracted by army asso-
Citations. lie has been dead eight years,
but | cannot even at this distance of time
recall his memory, and the circumstances
of his death without the bitterest grief.
Have you ever seen the grave suddenl y
close upon your best affections /? | hope
not, and l sincerely hope, that God will
so tenderly care for you, that you may 60
first to the grave. was stunned, para.
lyzed and almost crazed by my beloved
husbands death. In my agony l said
many rebellious things. wished that
God had taken my children and every
member of my family, SO that my hus-
band had been spared to me. | was par
TALLY aroused from this bitterness and un.
natural feeling by the death ofmy young.
est brother. He died Of the same fever


Spread through the country,it was though,
by the doctors, by the army. We now
had war and pestilence too, with us. The
doctors were busy. Nearly every house
like the Egyptians of old had one dead


My mother still had five sons living. but
all away in the army. They were op.
posed to secession, but Virginia was n-
vadcd and called upon them, and they
answered to a man. And it was strange
but true, in those awful times, the rebel
secessionists were not as prompt to fight
the war, they themselves had brought ON


as were their slow and rightly judging
neighbors, called the Union men And
to this day my brothers though they
fought the war through and stacked arms
with Gen. Lee at Appomattox Court


House, say they hate secessionist more
than they ever did Yankee. You can
well imagine my mothers unhappy situa'
ton. Herself widow, her children al


dispersed in the battle ranks, and of al


her stately race, but one, broken heart


ed, subdued, widowed daughter, with her


Oh l think of those times now and won


der how lived through them. The poet


says though "stil comes not death tC
those who mourn" The newspapers were
eagerly scanned and the Post Offices reg


ularly beseiged. Such eager, staring faces
you never saw. A deathly stiffness fill


ing the largest. assemblies, broken occa


sionally by the sob and shrek of some
stricken one. Poor bleeding heart, hei
father, husband, sou or brother was gone


Had fought his last battle and received q
soldiers burial. How many. many case,
have seen like this. The poor, pale


wan face, lit with hope before the open


ing of the mail and in a few minutes des.


pair, grief and agony carved in every line


A first cousin of mine COL c.. and grea


favorite of my mothers, loved almost a,


a son, was the Mt 1t in our family to 60


He died bravely at the head of his mer


on the second battle of Manassas. ii,


was buried right where he fell and liel


there to this day. the family having


been since the war too poor to remov,


his remains. His widow was at tho de


pot when the news came Of his death. Ii


the crowd end the curious excitement o
the moment, none noticed the poor, trem