January 30^th 1863

 

My Dear Father—

                        This will be handed to you by Lieut. John Dixon quondam Sergeant Major of my Reg'm't. I sent to you to day by mail a letter containing $350. Dolls. to be passed to my credit in acct. and trust you may get it safely. Yeamans here, and mustered in, but miserable Clancy still hangs around the Brigade. He will I trust soon go. Berry is now a Major General, and has taken his farewell of our Brigade in a General Order. Understanding he was to leave for Washington to-morrow myself and Officers some thirty in number paid him our farewell visit this afternoon. I made a little speech and he made a big one, and then the little side withdrew. The poor man looks miserable, and I really believe it behooves him to interest himself more in the stars above, than in a couple here below. he cannot weather it much longer for he is a shipwreck now. He seemed pleased at our visit, and well might he, for to navigate safely through the mud & holes & snow between our Reg'm't and his Greatness was a task of no ordinary accomplishment. Stoneman is away on a sick leave, and Dan Sickles commands or damns / (quite synonymous) our Corps. Birney poor Birney so far is left out in the cold, and without a Maj-Generals coat to keep him warm. I fear too his coat of self pride &c is now somewhat shinier and that the poor sinner may catch cold. I am very sorry and would not for the world prevent his catching a very bad one, but for him to have a cold great in an inverse ratio to his actual greatness would certainly suffocate him at once. Let him suffocate, nor would I care to borrow an oriental simile, if the jackasses did step over his grave—and yet I wouldn't injure a hair of his whiskers (He hasn't got any) Berry told me Hooker had directed him to remain here, and that he would have a command "near at home". I infer therefore that he may take command of the Corps, and Stoneman be either promoted or assigned elsewhere. The Commissions of all the new or parvenu M. G's date alike and rank is according to old commission—consequently Stoneman being the oldest Brigadier if made M.G. will become the biggest, & eldest Tad in the puddle, and all the little Tads like B. will constrainedly smile, call him "Friend" and fight to carry his tail, while all the while itching to cut it off. Not a very beautiful simile, I grant, but a moral one as it tends to make a man think / of his latter end, and only intended for your own edification. Lieut. Dixon remains in New York some six days, and if you have any little nick-nacs to send to me, give it or them in his charge. Send nothing to me by the Express for if you do, it only goes as far as the Office, or the appetite of the employees therein will make it. My new Lieut. Colonel is a valuable man. I am troubled no longer by loose cigars, eatables &c laying around, and have much less leisure than before to collect the same myself. Joe Yeamans sits upon my trunk by the fire, looking as wise as a goose in a mud-puddle, and will make a fine Officer as soon as the pine leaves turn yellow—perhaps even before. But I write in too facetious a vein for you dear Father, and must check myself, if possible, through to New York, or what is better close, and play checkers with my Major. I am well and expecting every day to hear from home.

 

Give my love to all and believe me

                                                           

Your Aff. Son.

Fred.

 

I am the Second Senior Officer in my Brigade, the first Col. Roberts goes away in a day or two and I shall be in command. I used to think a Colonel was a high magnate, but now I deem one common, and a Brigadier not much. true is it that "familiarity breeds contempt"—of Brigadiers—

 

P.S. I inclose twenty cents in stamps, of no value to me. I would like to purchase that amount of sense, and present the same to an Officer we both know—

 

 

 

1863

Jany 30

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