2022-11 Raynors HCA Auction
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 11/18/2022
A Union soldier letter written and signed by George Hunter who enlisted on 9/7/1861 as a Corporal, 9/7/1861 mustering into "G" Co. WI 10th Infantry, was promoted to sergeant, and was Mustered Out on 11/3/1864. Hunter was wounded 10/8/1862 Perryville, KY. The 4pp. letter to his parents is datelined Marietta Georgia, December 2, 1864. In part, " ... I have no cause to complain but every reason to be thankful that my life has been spared while so many brave comrades have fallen by the enemy's bullets .... There is a rumor that Atlanta is in our possession ... Sherman moved five Corps down toward Macon and two Corps fell back to the river ... Those Corps occupied the Macon RR and as nigh as I can learn followed down toward Macon which drew the whole Reb. Army after him. There is various conjectures regarding the move ... getting the Rebs out where we can whip them by letting them be the assaulting party. ... Reb accounts of Prisoners taken is very near correct, yet they say nothing about eighteen hundred mules our boys sabered for them & burning of wagons ... I have heard a rumor that our men captured with Atlanta and beyond eleven thousand prisoners. There is also a rumor of the capture of one brigade of our men who were guarding the wagon train in the rear of Sherman ..." Hunter continues with his thoughts on the speculation of gold ... "it is a shame the way a set of unprincipled men have run gold up ... the poor man suffers by it ..." On September 2, Mayor James Calhoun, along with a committee of Union-leaning citizens including William Markham, Jonathan Norcross, and Edward Rawson, met a captain on the staff of Maj. Gen. Henry W. Slocum, and surrendered the city, asking for "protection to non-combatants and private property". Sherman, who was in Jonesboro at the time of surrender, sent a telegram to Washington on September 3, reading, "Atlanta is ours, and fairly won"
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