Raynors HCA 2016-10
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 10/21/2016
War-date Union officer's letter, 8pp. 8vo., written by Lt. William M. Thurston, Battery F (Ricketts), 1st Pennsylvania Light Artillery, "Camp in Fort Stedman, Va.," Oct. 23, 1864, in part: "…the soldiers are quite healthy except chills and ague very many complain with it…nothing unusual going on save ingenious preparations for the coming campaign which cannot long be delayed. Recruits continue to arrive in large numbers. The army looks like [it did] last spring when we broke camp near Brandy Station, but a few battles will soon deplete the ranks and urge the call for more men. We recd the news of Sheridan gaining a great victory over Longstreet in the Valley. We fired a salute of one hundred guns…there was great rejoicing over the news. The Rebs hollowed over to us and wanted to know what had happened. We told them, they proposed three cheers for McClellan which the McC. boys on our side joined making the air ring. This was then a subject of a spirited discussion among the two parties for the last two days, why the Rebs cheered for Little Mack. We fired direct into Petersburg. The shells went crasting through the city in a frightful way, but the place is accustomed to like visitors and…was nothing new to the inhabitants…today…a private of the 5th N. H. pitched his tent in a ditch near Fort Stedman…when he awoke he spied the leg of a dead man sticking out of the bank near his face. This man was killed on the 17th June when the fort was made the ditch came close by his feet…the recent rains washed the ground from his feet…last night a mortar shell from one of the Rebel batteries fell on the grave of a poor soldier. It threw the corpse out of its resting place in a…putrefied condition. He was buried with his accoutrements and blanket…a man by the name of Noble of Phila came to…get the body of his son who was killed on the 17th June. Two of our boys went with him to…point the grave …he went bitterly over to the grave. The boys disinterred the body and placed it into a neat coffin. He had purchased for the corpse. He had the appearance of an old man say fifty. His head was gray. He said that it was the second son he had lost in the army. The boys said when he beheld the body of his son the scene was heart rending beyond description. He cried like a child showing signs of deep sorrow and despair…I was out walking this morning where we fought on the 16th and 17th of June. The ground was one vas grave yard you could not imagine how many have been killed during there summer…Cousin Stephen and Gerald Fening have both been home. They were both wounded. They are both objects of pity and some one should look after them. They squandered all their money and no one to correct them…W. Thurston, Battery F, 1st Pa. Arty, 2nd Corps…". VG
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