Hampton's Legion, Camp Wigfall Jan 16^th 1862

 

My dear Grace

                        I am, as I ought to be, heartily ashamed of myself for not having written to you long since. My only excuse, I am very much afraid, will be thought by you to be almost worse than the fault. That is I have treated all my correspondents in the same way. However I promise faithfully to turn over a new leaf, and be for the future a good boy. The woolen cap that you have sent for me, and perhaps knitted for me, was most acceptable. Though the sight of it reproached my guilty soul for the neglect of a so prompt and affectionate correspondent as yourself. It proved at least however, that you bore no malice, and that I might risk even at this late date a short letter. Indeed / my dear cousin it is hard enough (in fact impossible) to find anything to interest yourself, much less your friend and correspondents, in this life of inaction and constantly-to-be-disappointed expectation, to which the policy of our obstinate President has condemned us. For the time being the center of excitement seems to have left the Potomac and gone back again to South Carolina. We are all anxiously looking for news from the South but hear very little. The latest news from there however keeps us on the tip of expectation. We hear that the Yankees have landed on the main-land, and were marching on the Charleston and Savannah R.R. I confess, I feel decidedly uneasy about our own individual interests. I would not like to be made bankrupt for the advantage of the Yankees. We hear that there are any number of troops in the state, and I hear moreover / that Frank's company has raised itself into a reality. I was afraid at one time that it would turn out to be a myth. I suppose from the number of strangers who have taken refuge in Columbia, that it is by no means so dull a place, the young ladies still as enthusiastic on the subject of drawers shirts etc for the soldiers. Do you see much of Natha[?] and the rest of my excited kith and kin, who have flown from the wrath of the ruthless invader? How do those beaux-loving young ladies our friends of the "spiked railings" stand the times. Miss Sally ( I.C.C.'s Becky darling) sent me a very pretty scarf. I improved the occasion and wrote a very elaborate letter of thanks, which I hoped would draw forth a reply. But I suppose that either Papa Mama or the fair herself must have objected for no letter have I got. When you see those fair damsels give them my kindest regards. /

 

There is nothing in our life here to write about, except that the health of those you know is excellent, and the weather very warm wet and debilitating. There is no prospect whatever, that I see, of our getting any opportunity of seeing our friends at home, before this term of our enlistment expires, and possibly with very many not then. So we are living on the last look that we took of them, when we left, and the future. If the Yankees had not been so cowardly about that Mason & Slidell affair, I think we might have soon returned to our homes satisfied generally. But "L'homme propose et Dieu Dispose". Do give again my thanks to Ellen for the [?]. Give my love to Aunt Harriet. Love to the rest of the family. Tell Frank that he will soon receive my long delayed letter. I am

                                                                                                           

Yours affectionately

John T. Rhett

 

P.S. I'll be obliged to make you pay for the pleasure of my correspondence. I can get neither a stamp nor silver

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