Camp 13^th N. H. Vols near Portsmouth Va Friday July 10^th 1863

 

Dear Wife I take this the first opportunity I have had for almost three weeks to write a few lines to you to let you know how I am where I am and how I am getting along. The last letter I wrote to you was two weeks ago last Sunday in which I think I told you that we were under marching orders but we did not know where we were going. Well we packed up everything except tents and and started at one oclock Monday morning and marched to the city of Portsmouth Va and took transports at about eight and went to Fort Monroe and from there up the York river to the city of Yorktown and landed and went into camp there and staid there three days and then took the boat and went up the York to West Point and then took the Pamunkey (a branch of the York) and went up to White House landing and stoped there two days and started from there and marched fourteen miles to King William Court House and stopped there that night. After we pitched our tents the boys went down into a large wheat field and the grain was all cut and shocked and took the wheat straw to lie on and by the time we got it up to the camp ground the order came to carry it all back and so we carried it back and piled it up and in about fifteen minutes some one had set it on fire and burned it all up and then we tried to get some straw that was in a building there (a large two story building) and they would not let us have that so some of the boys set that on fire and by ten o'clock it was burned to the ground well the next morning we started again and marched to a place called Aylets Mills and arrived there at about eleven oclock A.M. / Well we encamped and staid at Aylets Mills that afternoon and night and while we were there every minute or two we could hear the report of a rifle an expiring squeal and the next you would see would be some soldier coming in with a pig or a sheep on his back. Well we started the next morning and went to a place called Taylor's farm arriving there at about eleven oclock at night on the 3^rd day of July. Well the next day (the 4^th) we took up our line of march toward Hanover Court House and after marching five or six miles our Reg stopped and the rest of the Division filed past us and we stopped all night there and the next day we started back at about ten A.M. and reached Taylors farm at noon and stayed there till five P.M. and then started from there and marched twenty miles that night. Started at five the next morning and marched to King William Court House a distance of fifteen miles reaching there at noon stopped that afternoon and night started again the next morning at eight and reached the White House at noon went into camp and the 13^th was detailed to guard the teams from the White house to Fort Monroe and I with several others of our company went to the doctor and got excused and got on board the steamer Juniata and rode down to Portsmouth and walked up to camp arriving here about three oclock yesterday Afternoon. Well I must close for it is getting late so good night and a kiss for you from your husband Joe 

 

Saturday July 11^th six oclock A.M. Dear Hannah I will try and finish my letter this morning. While we were on that march the weather was awful hot and we started from camp in hevey marching order with our knapsacks packed and containing everything that we had and on the first days march out the boys began to throw away their overcoats (By the way speaking of overcoats makes me think I sent my overcoat home in Lems box and he sent the box to his fathers and my overcoat is the one that once had a red lining in it though there is not much of it left now) to help lighten their knapsacks and the second day they began to throw away everything except rubber blankets and shelter tents and every thing was strewed along the road woolen blankets shirts drawers and stockings all torn to pieces so as not to be of any service to the rebels if they ever should get them. I saw piles of blankets shirts knapsacks and the like as large as a cord of wood with not a thing in them but what was torn so as to be useless the woolen blankets torn in strips from two to three inches in width and the other things the same. When we got back to White House landing there was not forty knapsacks in our whole Regiment and in our Co. there was not one knapsack in our whole Co when we got back to White House landing. When I went to the doctor to get a chance to ride the Regiment had got orders to march down to Fort Monroe a distance of seventy six miles for a guard to the baggage train of wagons taken from the rebels by Spiers cavalry just before we went up to the White House. The reason that I went and got excused was that when I got most up to King William Court House I got my boots so worn out that I could not wear them any longer and so I threw them / away and so I went the rest of the march about ninty five miles barefooted and my feet was a little sore by the time that I got back down to the White House. Well we have received three or four mails since the Reg started one or two at Yorktown one at White house and one at Taylors farm but I have not got a letter from you since the Reg left camp. I have got five letters that are still unanswered that I have received. It is so awful hot that I cannot write in the day time so I have to do all of my writing in the morning or at night and I guess in the course of two or three weeks I shall get this letter finished. It has been a very hot day today and the flies are so thick that we cannot sit still and if a fellow moves it raising such a cloud of flies that that you cant hardly see where you are going. By the way while we have been gone on this march ano of the boys here died of the small pox. He was about half a mile from camp down in the woods where he was sent with three other fellows six weeks ago last Saturday. His name was Joseph A. Tuttle of Bow Pond and the fellows that were with him were Charles H Berry and George H. Hanscom of Strafford and Charles Burt of Littleton N. H. The other three have all got well and are back in camp now. Well give my love to all and here is a kiss my love and good wishes to you and I shall have to close so good bye till I see you again which I hope will be soon Write soon and I remain your loving husband   Joseph H Prime

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