Chattanooga                           

October the 18^th /63

           

Dear Mother

                       I seat my self once more to answer your kind and welcome letter whitch i received on yesterday and i was hapy to hear from you and to hear you was well i was sory to hear ove walters bad [faded] i hope it will be all right in a fiew days a gain my health is good you say you hant had any letter from me sense the battle i have wrote two sense the battle [faded] you hant received them [faded] misslaid one [faded] is in our rear and has tore up the railroad [faded] our men are driving them [faded] you wanted me to give you the perticulars of the battle in the last / letter i gave you nearly all the perticulars our division was in the battle of [faded] Gap we lost two killed and wounded we escaped the bloody battle of Chicamauga but we was in the field all the time our brigade was kept as reserve and was run backwards and forwards til the last [faded] two oclock General Negley was ordered back to the rear 4 mile to the cross roads to form his men in line to stop straglers that was broken up by the desperate fighting ove the rebles so we remained their til the next morning that night the hole ove our army fell back til where we were but the men fought hard over evry inch of ground that they was over [faded] evry person nows this but i know the rebles loss is farr greater than hours our loss is twelve thousand the rebles has shelled us sense we came in here but did not do us mutch  damage when i wrote to you that day they had been shelling us all day and i stated that i expected to be / wakened up that night by sound of their shells and shure a nough at two oclock they began and i was wakened up they explosion of a shell within two rodds of where i was laying it was rather close [faded] to feel comfortable they kept [faded] when they stoped and fiered but little sense our troops throws some shell over a mongs them evry day what damage it does i dont know the reble camps is very close to us we can see them very plain it is thought that they are getting on some large guns they have possession ove lookout mountain and it is very high and they have a full view ove all our troops that is here at this place we are expecting them to open up [faded paper fold] may compell us to leave in that way but if they try to take this by storm before we leave this side of the river we will destroy the reble army or the greatest part of it on the south side never to bother any [faded] they have 175 thousand men now in our front and diserters that comes / in say they are fortifying themselves we can talk to their pickets when we are on picket we ant alowed to do it we exchange papers with them evry day the pickets [faded] one a nother except [faded] General Negley has left us and is going home to recruit his health some ove the Generals here is very mutch down on him and i dont know for what reason except he was raising to fast for them and knew a little more than they did [faded] he considered the 78^th regiment [faded] leave his old division when he was [faded] it was harder on him to tell us he was going to leave [faded] than it would for him to [faded] the hole division fairly worship him he [faded] / division and made a short speech to all ove his regts and they cheered him all a long the lines he was loved by all the soldiers but some ove the other Generals was down on him because he was raising faster than [faded] him and he left some ove them [faded] him ove cowardice in the battle i supose you have saw in the papers before this time that Negleys division broke up and left him i supose some ove the Generals paid some reporter well for writing it and it is a lie and two of his brigades was in the battle [faded] consolidating the divisions here now we are in General R[?] division now he has the name ove being a good [faded] and i hope he is you want me to give you account of all [faded] i dont know as it would do you any good to know it if i live [faded] / will tell you ove it we are on half rashions but if we can hold this place i am willing to put up with it i think by the i write to you a gain that i can tell you for surtin wheather we can hold [faded] they say General Hoocker[faded]

 

yours as ever Abram Kipp

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