Beaufort, S. C. May 2d, 1862.
My dear Mother:
May has opened charmingly in Beaufort. The air is warm but
not oppressive. We are luxuriating in green peas, strawberries, blackberries,
all the early vegetables, and the fig trees, loaded with fruit, will soon
supply us with an abundance of green figs. Fish are supplied by the rivers in
great plenty. Indeed we are well supplied with all sorts of good things, so we
have little of which we can complain, except inaction. It is now fifteen days
since a mail has reached us from the North. Telegraphic news in the columns of
the Charleston Mercury dated the 26th, speaks of the city being in great
alarm from the advancing army and fleet of Genl. Butler. A sailing vessel
occasionally brings us a newspaper from the North. Otherwise we would be quite
separated from the rest of mankind, and would be compelled to consider the
North as having regularly seceded from us.
I have received the beautiful flag you sent me. I gave it to
the boys of the Company, who were delighted. The other companies are quite
envious. Thanks, dear Mother, a thousand times, for the expression of your
love.
I think after all I must have that new suit of clothes I
wrote for before. Notwithstanding all efforts to the contrary, my old suit will
persist in growing daily rustier, and more unseemly in the seams. So if you
will please have the suit ordered, I shall find good use for it full as soon as
it shall be ready for me.
Tell Mr. Johnson I had a right pleasant time with his friend
Bronson, and add too that Sloat’s men produced such an effect on the 79th
Regiment, that it is impossible to persuade them that the whole affair
of allotment is anything more than a Jew swindle. I am looking forward with
great delight to the next steamer arrival, anticipating a heavy mail after so
long neglect. There is so little of interest to write. I believe I wrote you
there was quite a charming lady, a Mrs. Caverly, stopping at the General's. Her
husband is dying with consumption and has come here to try the effect of the
climate. You can imagine that a pretty and lively lady makes quite a difference
in the house.
You do not know how inexpressibly indignant I feel at the
attacks made on McClellan. They are certainly most scandalous, and calculated
to ensure his defeat were he in any wise what his enemies represent him. It is
the height of folly to suppose that men are going to sacrifice their lives,
unless they have good reason to suppose that they are to be brought at the
right moment to the right spot to play their part in gaining a victory. You
have only to convince them that incompetent men are putting them in positions
to occasion a defeat, and they will run before a shot is fired. It would seem
that the enemies of McClellan are doing their utmost to produce that sort of
spirit of distrust in our troops, so as to lead to new disasters. I am sick and
tired of these howling politicians who would be willing to see everything we
consider holy destroyed, provided they could only under the new regime get
the Governmental patronage of the devil.
Affec'y. your son,
Will.
Flourishes supposed to indicate genius.
SOURCE: William Chittenden Lusk, Editor, War Letters
of William Thompson Lusk, p. 143-5
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