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American Civil War ➔ Civil War letter William H. Holmes 1st N.Y. Light Artillery to E.S. Holmes
Identifier:
135470.2Description:
Letter from William Holmes to his Uncle from Headquarters of "Cothran's Battery" midway between Sperrysville and Culpepper Courthouse Virginia. William has joined the "Northern Black Horse Cavalry Regiment" which becomes the 1st New York Light Artillery Regiment. The Regiment is part of the Army of the Potomac seeing action at Antietam, Chancellorsville, and Atlanta. Holmes is discharged in Raleigh North Carolina April 28th, 1865.; Headquarters Cochran's BatteryMidway between Sperrysville and Culpepper
Courthouse
August 8th, 1862
Kind Uncle,
Your letter was received sometime since & you may be assured I was glad to hear from you. I had looked long & in vain for a letter from you & had given it up entirely, when unexpectedly I recd one. We have been on the march for the last two days. We started wednesday morning from near little Washington & marching through Sperrysville & Woodville, at each of which places we saw quite a body of troops, belonging to Seigles corps. We stopped over the first night a little this side of Woodville having marched 12 or 14 miles. Yesterday we came on to this place, making a very slow march of about 4 miles. Our brigade Brig. Gen. Gordan's is here & another force, Brig. Gen. & ex Gov. of Kansas Geary's . The 1st Brigade Brig. Gen. Crawford's (formerly Col. Donnelleys) & to which the 28th is still attached; is I suppose & has been at some time at Culpepper Courthouse. I suppose we were going there immediately when we started on our march.It is about 10 miles from here, toward Gordansville. Gen. Pope is making quite a stir in this part of the country, is hauling up all the old sesesh citizens & enforcing the regulations of war among the soldiers & officers too. We were reviewed by him last Sunday morning. He's a fine looking man, good size but not large, rather portly. He has now a pretty good force under him.. The indications now seem to be that the war is to be carried on more according to your style than it has been. I had hoped that the rebellion would be suppressed without any resort being made to drafting, but as things now are I was rather glad to see the Pres' proclamation ordering out 300,000 militia before the 15th of Aug. in addition to the 300,000 vols which are to be enrolled by that time. If government can arm & equip these men immediately, we can have by the 1st of Oct. an effective force of 1,000,000 men, most of them can be put to good use much sooner. A sufficient number of the first drafted should be put in the old Reg's to fill them up. They would be effective in a very short time. The remainder of the 600,000 could relieve drilled troops who are guarding places in our rear, & at the same time fitting themselves for the field. We need the men immediately, our forces are now obliged to act rather on the defensive at almost every point. This Proclamation and some of Pope's orders (which you most likely see in the papers) look something like ending the war. We have travelled through a good deal of middle VA. since I came out here & have had a chance to see considerable of the country & something of the people, though society, if they ever had any thing here worthy of that name, is a good deal broke up by the war. I have seen enough however to convince me that the system of slavery is an evil, not so much on account of the hardships & abuse of the negros, for there is but liitle of that in this part of the state but on account of its influence on society, agriculture, & improvement generally. We see here none or but few schoolhouses but few churches & in short everything is a century behind the age. Aug. 14th Camp near Culpepper C.H.; since commencing this we have made several marches & had one of the most desperate & bloody battles of the war.We, our battery was not immediately engaged at all during the day, though we were in position all day & momenttarily expected either to be ordered where the rebels were, or that they would attack us where we were. After dark when the enemy attempted to follow up the advantage he had gained over our Infantry & came near getting up a panic in our whole force by throwing shell into a field where our men & most everything else were, we were ordered to the extreme front, right in front of their battery. Some 4 or 5 other batteries which had just came up were put in position just then & such a shower of shell was poured into the woods and soon drove them battery & all out of the woods. We had one man wounded by a shell that eve. We remained at the front under Seigle until night before last when we came back to our Brigade. Bank's whole Corps has all fallen back to near this town. It is unfit for the field at present, its very much reduced in numbers & the officers are a great many of them lost. Our loss was very late though not as great as at first supposed. The 28th have fairly earned them the name of "bloody 28th". They were badly cut up but I have thus far been unable to learn anything particular about them. Had I time or space I might write some particulars about what I saw which might be interesting to you. You'll see the most in the papers, though a good deal in them is incorrect especially in giving particulars. There was mismanagement somewhere, our infantry were allowed to be overpowered & forced to retire after many of them have been killed & wounded, & after having fought as well as ever men fought, when McDowell's forces were near at hand & Seigles not far off. Where the blame should rest I don't know, but I must bring this to a close. Give my love to Aunt Ori & Freda(?) & remember me to Miss Clark, write again as soon as you can. Your nephew, friend, Willie H.
