HEADQUARTERS DEPT. OF VIRGINIA,
Fortress Monroe,
June 1st, 1861.
My Dear Mother, — Somehow
I find myself here on Gen. Butler's staff, acting military secretary at
present, and here I shall stay, if the business remains as intensely
interesting as now. Billy also writes me from Washington that I am to be appointed
First Lieutenant in the Army. My rank as Secretary is, I suppose, Captain or
perhaps Major, so you see I am in the line of promotion. Please write to me
here, dear mother, at once. I cannot take time to write, for things thicken all
the while. We shall not have fighting, but the preparations are busy. All the
manuscripts in the drawer and the trunk please preserve with care, as they must
make my fortune when I am a half-pay officer, with no arms or legs. Lively work
presently. Address me for the present simply T. W., Care Maj.-Gen. Butler,
Fortress Monroe, Virginia.
SOURCE: Laura Winthrop Johnson, Editor, The Life and
Poems of Theodore Winthrop, p. 290
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