Monday, June 15, 2015

Elizabeth Payson Prentiss to Miss Shipman, August 17, 1862

G. is really up and about, looking thin and white, and feeling hungry and weak; but little H. has been sick with the same disease these ten days past. I got your letter and the little cat, for which G. and I thank you very much. I should think it would about kill you to cook all day even for our soldiers, but on the whole can not blame any one who wants to get killed in their service. I am impressed more and more with their claims upon us, who confront every danger and undergo every suffering, while we sit at home at our ease. However, the ease I have enjoyed during the last five weeks has not been of a very luxurious kind, and I have felt almost discouraged, as day after day of confinement and night after night of sleeplessness has pulled down my strength. But, what am I doing? Complaining, instead of rejoicing that I am not left unchastised.

SOURCE: George L. Prentiss, The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss, 207-8

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