In Their Own Words
October 02, 1863
Civil War Soldier Reminisced about Trip with Wife
A Georgia soldier camped near Chattanooga wrote to his wife, telling her about a large number of men from his company leaving without permission, then reminiscing about a trip the two had taken to the same area years earlier.
“…There was 22 of my company that went home but they all went without leave. I couldn’t do that, it would not do me any good to go home that way. If I live I think I will get a furlough this winter… Molly, I little thought this fall two years ago when we was together in Chattanooga - so happy together, that today I would be so near there under the circumstances that I am under. I am [with]in two miles of the room where we stayed. I can’t help but love the spot…”
Source: Ronald H. Moseley (ed.), The Stilwell Letters: A Georgian in Longstreet’s Corps. Army of Northern Virginia (Macon: Mercer University Press, 2002), p. 215-216.
