[fragment]

 

No 2.

            I have once finished your letter but I forgot one or two things so will add a little more. You speak of our being down on the black soldiers. There has been a great prejudice against them but it is growing less every day, that they are not cowards they are proving every day. Our commanders are greatly to blame for much of the feeling that has been manifested against them. In every Dept. hundreds of Negroes have been living on the Govt. and doing nothing while the soldiers have had much hard work to do. They saw the Negroes loafing about and heard their "your" "yaw" and learned to despise the whole gang. we did not stop to consider that it was more the fault of commanders than of the Negroes. Yet the fewer Negroes we have in this country the better off we shall be I think / I wish to see them treated like human beings but I don't like them as a class. Many of the women and some of the men are strong secesh, nothing pleases them more than to get hold of some good Reb news and then lingo it off to our soldiers whenever we happen into their shanties. I notice them about as much as I would dogs, they are so ignorant that I can hardly despise them.

 

            It is said that Vicksburg is really ours this time. I will wait 'till I know for certainty and then throw up my hat if it's true. [?] cant stand long if that's gone.

 

            Don't think I now have any of that feeling that I had in S.C. We saw enough there to make the bravest discontented. Troops that were with McClellan before Richmond say that that life on St. Helena was the toughest of anything that they have found. The men of North are willing to fight whenever called upon to do so but they will be slaves to no men. We had hard work to keep from that while in S.C.

 

            All is going on finely here and I do not write it to please you when I write that I am contented. If the Govt. is not doing all that it should we of this Dept. are well cared for and are having easy times.                       

C.C.

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