Monday, July 27, 2026

Diary of 2nd Lieutenant Benjamin F. Pearson, January 28, 1863

Morning cold the mud froze so it bears a man up, The Cavilry took a skout yesterday afternoon & about 200 of them went out to a Rebble ball at Lagrange 15 miles west of Helena, they took 5 Rebbles Soldiers & spies in our uniform & 8 Citizens & some of them ran when the cavelry rode up, & John Westenberger from near Centerville Iowa who is in the 3rd Iowa Cavelry dismounted & ran after them hallowing halt but they did not heed & he shot down a Reb Capt Gib or Gibbs he died in a few minutes. Westenberger tended me1 when I built Wadlingtons house at Centerville. I finished pointing up our cabbin I feel very unwell my bones all ache & my back is verry painfull.
_______________

1 The writer was a brick and stone mason by trade.

SOURCE: Edgar R. Harlan, Currator, Annals of Iowa, 3rd Series, Vol. 15, No. 2, October 1925, pp. 106-7

No comments: