When Soldiers speak, it “Rings of the Pure Mettle.” From a private letter received by our fellow citizen, Mr. Marietta of Ottawa, we are permitted to make the following extract. If our soldiers don’t make “short work” of some of the cowardly villains, on their return, who delight in stabbing them in the back by whining “Peace,” there is no judging of a pending storm by peals of heaviest thunder.
Well I want to know what you at home think about the war. For my part, believe that the war would have been settled long before to-day if the South had not been encouraged by those in the North who seek the destruction of the Government, just to accomplish their own designs. Now the question will arise. who are they? Well, they are a set of men who call themselves “Conservative Democrats, or, “Peace Democrats.” They are doing more to prolong the war than the meanest rebel in the South. Well I will tell you what I think of such men. – I think they never ought to die a natural death; and hell would be too good a place for them. It makes my blood boil to think that while thousands of our brave soldiers have fallen in battle, and thousands more are willing to offer their lives to sacrifice to the good old stars and stripes and while we are thus contending to preserve the honor of that emblem of our fore-fathers, those who ought to be engaged with us in the great struggle, are in reality our most bitter enemies, and doing all they can to defeat the Union cause. Well, all we ask of such men is to keep still, for we know they are cowards and will never fight on either side.
I know that secession is about played out. They say themselves that unless they can succeed in dividing the North the thing is “gone up.” They are becoming alarmed, and a few more victories on our side, will decide the contest.
Deserters from Bragg’s army are coming in almost every day; they report things in a horrible condition.
F. Marietta
– Published in The Union Sentinel, Osceola, Iowa, Saturday, March 14, 1863
Well I want to know what you at home think about the war. For my part, believe that the war would have been settled long before to-day if the South had not been encouraged by those in the North who seek the destruction of the Government, just to accomplish their own designs. Now the question will arise. who are they? Well, they are a set of men who call themselves “Conservative Democrats, or, “Peace Democrats.” They are doing more to prolong the war than the meanest rebel in the South. Well I will tell you what I think of such men. – I think they never ought to die a natural death; and hell would be too good a place for them. It makes my blood boil to think that while thousands of our brave soldiers have fallen in battle, and thousands more are willing to offer their lives to sacrifice to the good old stars and stripes and while we are thus contending to preserve the honor of that emblem of our fore-fathers, those who ought to be engaged with us in the great struggle, are in reality our most bitter enemies, and doing all they can to defeat the Union cause. Well, all we ask of such men is to keep still, for we know they are cowards and will never fight on either side.
I know that secession is about played out. They say themselves that unless they can succeed in dividing the North the thing is “gone up.” They are becoming alarmed, and a few more victories on our side, will decide the contest.
Deserters from Bragg’s army are coming in almost every day; they report things in a horrible condition.
F. Marietta
– Published in The Union Sentinel, Osceola, Iowa, Saturday, March 14, 1863
