Murfreesboro Tennessee

April the 5^th 1863

                                   

Dear Mother

                    I seat my self this beautiful afternoon to answer your kind letter that i received on yesterday and i was hapy to hear ove you all enjoying good health i am hapy to tell you i am well a gain and getting a long as well as i could expect. well we are still in town yet they boys are all in pretty good health the weather here has been very nice and warm for a fiew days past it is very warm during the day but at night it gets very cold but i supose we have some nicer weather here than you have at home but if i was at home i could make my self comfortable if the weather was cold. well mother you wanted to have my advice a bout alie going to school to leechburgh i intended to write to you in the answer to your first letter a bout it but i intierly forgot a bout it and in the last letter i wrote to you i said something a bout it but you might not get my letter so you can see in this one for my part i think it is a good plan two dolars ant mutch so i would send her you say you dont think the draft will come of til the nine month men gets home they ant going to be any draft in pennsylvania unless we get defeated some where soon they wont be any till July or august at any rate for pennsylvania has furnished her quota ove the old call whitch the good part of the other states dident do so they think with them and the diserters that will come back in to make a nough troops at presant but that dont suit my stile a tal for i would like to see a large number of them coperheads drafted and sent out if they wouldent use them to keep them from preaching cecesh doctrine at home but that is all up with us now our loss was in great part thinking they would have / to come out but they will get of a gain i would like if the soldiers in the field had the say so for a bout two months if they wouldent be some graves of traitors in the north i dont know any thing. mother you nor any person else hant the least idea of the soldiers feelings in the army at this presant time i ant only speaking of our own regiment i am speaking of the army of the cumberland. evry regiment wants to go home to fight the coperheads i never saw the like the soldiers is determined to go on with the war until the rebles is whiped in the union and then they they say they wont ask any leave or any thing else but lick the traitors at home they are bound to do. mother you hant the chance their to see how the people at home has used the soldiers in the field but the soldier in the field can see and it makes their blood boil to read some of their speeches and of their meetings i have saw letters sent to some of our own company to disert and come home and they would protect them but if they dident get back some good letters i dont know any thing a bout it if the president would leave one regiment go home i do believe they would kill evry traitor in pennsylvania if they wouldent it would be because they couldent find them. all this fuss has got up gest because they was a fraid to go out in the army i tell you what wish i wish them coperheads and that is that they will be drafted and made march under a big knapsack and the schorching hot sun pouring down on them and nothing to eat but hard crackers and not a nough of them and no tobacco and no shoose and no rest and a hard battle evry week and that the hot dust will burn his feet to a crisp and that he may never have a postage stamp its self. you may think this is hard wishes but if you new what we have had to endure on their account you wouldent i hope when the time will come when i can talk to you a bout it i can tell you things that i cant well tell you now /

i want you to let me know if old Henry M^cKalliss hant turned a coperhead they have all quit writting to me. try and get me Ann Mackintars address for me in your next letter. well mother you needent be so uneasy a bout walter being drafted after he gets home they cant draft them for a year at any rate and they cant draft him any way for two out of three is all they can take he is safe a nough for the draft but if they wasent a nough men in this country without him i would say for him to go out a gain but they is plenty that hant been out so leave them try it on a while do you keep him from going if you can whitch i dont think will be hard to do well mother they was a nother fight in Kentuckey a fiew days a go our men drove them the loss i canot tell yet. well mother i sent you a paper so you can see how things goes in tennessee i subscribed for it for six months it is the Nashville union i paid for it i thought you would be glad to get the news from here you will get it evry week it is a bout the only good union paper i can see any more. well Mother you may think i am a bad boy but i tell you i have quit swearing and i dont drink any in fact i never made a practice of drinking mutch when i was at home but i used some very rough language be fore i left home but i am hapy to tell you i have quit both theas bad habits i wrote to tommy Stevenson and he hant answered it yet. well mother i told you in my last letter we was expecting a nother hard battle now it is hard to tell any thing a bout what is being done if the battle at vixburgh would come of then we will soon now what will be done our troops is fortifying here pretty strong if they attact us i believe we can whip them worse than we did before but if it wont be a victory to us i dont care so mutch a bout it but if it will be to our interest i dont care how soon it comes but i dont want to loose any of my frind comerads they is skirmishing in our front most every day but it dont amount to mutch it is only to feel one an a nothers strenth and position but it gets very thick some times but it must be done. now i will tell you a little / a bout hour grub we draw all hard crackers no soft bread and our meat is all together fat flitch and of the worst quality and we draw some fiew beens whitch is the best thing we get we draw coffee and shugar this is all we draw we get a nough as it is. i often laugh to my self when i am eating beens for you used to tell me at home when i wouldent eat them that i would see the day i would eat them mother i see in your letter that you fret your self a bout Daniel now mother you know it of any use and i do think he is better of to day i now it is hard to part with him but god nows best i have shed many a tear for my dear brother when out on post at night when i hant had any person near me many a good cry i have had for him but it was all of no use and now i hope you wont fret your self a bout him for i think he is better of where he is. i hant had a letter from walter for a week but i am expecting one in a fiew days i get some letters from John Potts i received a letter from a young man that is in the army of the Patomack i used to board at the same house on oil crick me and John Ross had intended going out with him but we couldent make it suit he has been in six battles and was wounded once and taking prisoner by the rebles and was exchanged and was in the battle of Fredricksburgh i tell you i was glad to hear from him. well mother as i hant mutch to write i will close hoping that theas fiew lines may find you all enjoying good health give ant mary my best respects and do you write soon and give me all the perticulars

                                                                       

Abram Kipp

                                   

write soon                           

               

Eliza Bann

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