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Letter on U.S. Christian Commission stationary
Jeffersonville, Indiana
November 17, 1864
Dear Mother,
I set down this morning to let you know that I have been moved further north. I got here last night about 9 o’clock. I feel as though I had got into America again. The town and everything looks so much different from what they did in Dixie. Our hospital is situated on the banks of the Ohio River so I can set and watch the boats play up and down the river. Sometimes there is as many as twenty to be seen at a time. [end of page one]
Last night they looked very pretty with their lamps all lit up. I am in hopes that this letter will reach you before [Rable] starts from home for you wouldn’t like to send those Yankees to N[ewark] While I am here at Jeffersonville. I don’t know but this letter will be rather late. You need’nt send that box until I write again for here we have to get the consent of the Doctor before we can get any which thing in here. Maybe we won’t need it here. I don’t know whether we get any sanataries here or not. I will wait and see before I write for them.
[Picture below of Jefferson General Hospital during Civil War]
I suppose that Mrs Harriet has commenced her school and that Father has got his [end of page two] corn picked by this time has he not, and you are trying to find something to do on Thanksgiving. Ain’t it most time for [initial indecipherable] Tremain to get home. I think so if they don’t keep him over his time which they are very apt to do. I notice how are all the neighbors today and I get that letter that letter that I sent to him without the stamps on. I am most out of stamps. I expect I might have some if they would let me stay in one place long enough. I expect I will let me stay here now till they send me to the front and I don’t know for sure that will be. [end of page three]
Well I want this letter to go out in this mornings mail so I will stop writing. Give my love to all and write often.
From your boy Franklin
Jefferson U.S. General Hospital
Ward 17
Jeffersonville, Indiana
Franklin A. Whitney
Post-war photograph of Franklin A. Whitney, 36th Illinois Infantry. He was listed as from Mission, Illinois, when he enlisted as a Private on 2/29/64. He mustered into Company F, 36th Illinois infantry 3/19/64. Mustering out 10/8/65 in Washington, D.C.
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Items in the Kraig McNutt Civil War Collection.
Unidentified Union soldier
Camp on Meridian Hill, Washington D.C.,
Nov 17 /61
letter reads in part:
”Bill Brant and all the Chathan boys are well and hearty and in fact the boys in our company with the exception of 3 that was not well when they came and they are going to be discharged and sent home soon. There is some talk of our going down to South Carolina soon but I can not tell now any thing about it for there is so much talk around camp about this thing and that so we wait until we hear it from the headquarters and that is not generally heard until the time is ready to start. I do not doubt but that we shall go down that way and perhaps soon for they do not mean to attack the enemy in their dens in Virginia right away, that is the opinion here. They are not prepared down south as they are Virginia therefore if we go below them we can come in behind their fixings. I hope this war may soon be brought to a close and peace and prosperity once more reign in our midst and we all be permitted to return to our homes in good health and strength as we now enjoy but we can not tell what may befall us but I hope we may be able to meet what ever it may be our lot to meet with our nerves calm and our hearts relying on god for support and strength and feel that we are doing our duty to god and to man and to never cause a blush of shame to come over our dear friends faces that we have left behind.”
Source: eBay, June 2007
