Marine Hospital New Orleans L.A. Nov 9^th 1863

 

Dear Wife

                                    I am agoing to write to you again a short letter in hopes that I may get answers to some of mine that I send north I have had no letter from you since the first one that you wrote after you came home from your visit to your folks. I cannot think you do not write any but for some reason I do not get any more from any body that I write to perhaps that they get tired of my trash that I write but they might at least say so and then I would know it

 

            I have written to you every week since I have been here except last week and I should have written then but I had nothing new to write and not only that but I was not able to write for I was pretty sick and had to keep my bed the most of the time but I made out to write a short letter to Mr Reynolds and put in twenty dollars for you we were paid of here last Wednesday and that that I sent went out Saturday morning so you will probably get it some days before you get this. but I shall enclose in this letter $10.00 for you and then send $10. more in my next Either to you or Reynolds which ever I write to first it will probably be you as I am getting smart again I shall write oftener even though I write short

 

            The doctors here are the kindest men to me that can be there is nothing that they can do but what they are willing to do Doctor Powers all the time that I was so sick kept urging me to ride out but I did not go for I thought that I was to weak but last Saturday I took his horse and buggy and went out some two miles from here to the cemetry a place that I had not seen before and I was well paid / for my ride in the first place the ride did me good and then it was a sight worth seeing to go the cemetry first I went to the Soldiers Burying ground there is about 5 acres in the lot and it is nearly all covered with soldiers graves as close together as they can be and but one in the yard that has any thing up for a head board except a board one has a plain marble slab with the soldiers name and age on he was a native here and his friends put up the stone. there must be as many as two thousand soldiers buried there now and more going there every day The other burying grounds have a different look all together as the most of the graves are kept up in nice style and are decorated with flowers both natural and artificial but I did not feel able to look around much that day and cannot describe them very well but I shall go there before long and spend a day and then I will give you a discription of the yards &c

 

The Doctor in charge of the hospital gave me a pass to go and come just when I wanted to and Doctor Powers says I can have his horse and buggy every day to go out with dont you think that he is a friend to me I do at any rate

 

            Yesterday I took his horse and went up to Carrollton the place where we first went into camp after we came here last winter but it does not look much as it did then there has been so many soldiers there that everything around nearly is distroyed the place has a deserted look although it is but 4 miles from New Orleans but there is no place that can be kept up where there is so many soldiers around all the time for they are the worst class of men to destroy things and property that I saw yet they are very liberal and kind to any one in need 

 

            To day I think that I shall go down in the city and to morrow I think I shall go to lake Ponchartrain the great watering place for the fashionable of New Orleans. it is about 7 miles from here and said to be a very nice place but I can tell when I see it

 

            But I must tell you what the doctor gave me a few days ago he called me to his room I did not know what for when I went in he told me to sit down and then went to his trunk while he was there he asked me if I had a watch and I told him I had not he then took one from his trunk and brought to me and said that I might have that as he did not want it any longer it is an old style of a watch but it keeps good time and I think it very cheap and shall keep it to remember the Doctor by I sent my old one home to you by Drake he started for home a week ago friday and must be nearly home now if he has had a favorable voyage

 

            I do not hear anything more from the Regiment and do not know where they are or what they are doing but hope I shall hear from them soon

    

            If Mrs french can pay the Express charges on them I will send her frenches cloths that is here and such other things as he left. If there is any one there that she can get to do it for her she can get his back pay and the bounty one hundred dollars that is due him. I will send her a certifficate of his death so that she can have something to work from and then if she would go to William Vanartys at Lyons he would get it for her I think the charges on his stuff would be probably three dollars it might be more or not so much I can not tell exactly what it would be there is his overcoat and blanket and cap and some other things I do not know all now 

 

            I send the certifficate of his death in this letter he had four months and 6 days pay due him when he died, about 54 dollars

 

            But I am getting pretty tired and shall have to stop for this time. I meant to have written this page to Frank & Lilly but must give it up for this time but will write to them soon give this ticket to lilly

 

            Write to me often and direct by way of New York so that they will not come down the river

 

Yours as Ever

L. V. Tucker

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