City Point August 12^th 1864

 

To My Dear little Wife

                        My dear i receivd your letter tuesday the one wrote after the receipt of abraham Sulphens i am at dismounted camp and am getting along better than ever befor that is making my monney easier i do nothing of any account only keep the rolls straight and that is not work run around and keep the men strait i am still looking up to somthing better i have had no late letters from you or any of the familie but i hope to soon you must send all letters to the rejiment until i send you father orders wich i hope to soon do i am trying to get in at headquarters for cleark and i think if their is another vacancy i will get it the other day their was one if it had not been for a stinking english man i would got that it would have served my time out writing and it is considered the best in the army ordanance clerk you can do all your writing in the forenoon and nothing to do untill next day while the others you have to be on hand all the time / so in case you are wanted to write an order or to write a pass your their but ordanance you only copy from another book wich it is writen in ever way i know this will find you well as i am very well now i am getting fat now i am growing i shall look for you to send me some more shirts i guess i have got only one red flanel one beside the one you sent i got that washed the other day but had to take it before it was ironed it looks bad but i shall put it on this afternoon you must send me one i do not know wat kind some kind of a dark one that will not fade but not wool ulless it is very soft this coarse red flanel is to hot but still i can wear it but i do not like to if you cannot get any kind but wool why get the best red flanel and put a blue flanel bosom in it do not make the sleaves to long but you know shrink the flanel first do not send any that wants starch on for it is hard to get i can get shirts hear but they want five dollars for them and i would not trade my old one that you sent the worst is to get a fellows goods clean but we have to go at it / once and a while missey this is the best pen i ever had and i mean to use it as often as i can in writing to you wat do i think about you often i think how happy we will be wen i come home and see you and the little boy i mean to buy a small lot just large enuf to keep us three not any larger not a bit and i mean to work the land and rais nothing but truck i think we can live so nice and happy i will be hard to pleas about the house though for i want it on ground a little sandy and i want flowers and shade all around it so it is cool in the summer i am going to make you live a happy life very if you can with me you will see why missey you will not know me now do not let the little boy forget me you must answer this as soon as you can and i will write you another loving episel i am well now and feel more like writing and have a good table to write on the first time i have ever had a table in my tent we live fine we have just been drawing rations for five dayes i like the rations all except the hardtack they bother me my teeth is so poor and they get worse you i suppoes will be glad wen you hear that i am well / they do not fight hear but the men wat has their horses killed or die comes hear to get others and then i comand some of them who would ever thought six months in the service and acting orderly sargent pretty good but i am still in reality nothing but a corporal but in time missey i may get a shoulder strap if they give me a cleark ship that is enuf all i want we had a terible accident hear the other day a boat loded with amunition blew up killing about 70 niggars and severl whites it blew some a distance of a mile or part of them at the distance of a mile i shall have to quit my tent mate wants the table for supper

 

good Bye with kisses without number

Henry H Covert

 

PS

tell me if your father got my

last letter and give him my

love tell him i would like to

look at his orchard and cornfield

for green corn i have had none but i

shall think about it good bye

 

H. H. Covert

tell [?] george [?] mary to wed

 

send all letters to the

rejiment

SOURCES