I had comforted
myself with the reflection that when we returned to Kentucky, where
communications were uninterrupted by guerillas, and were only separated by
twenty-four hours of time, I might be permitted to correspond with my family
without such harrowing delays, for I would not have my darling in doubt as to
my situation or whereabouts for one single day, knowing, as I do, the
uncertainty of suspense is worse than the reality. But 'tis said, "The
darkest hour is just before the dawn," and, even as I write, my mind
filled with dark thoughts, a ray of light from my Northern home flashes across
my vision. The whole current of my thought is changed, and thankfulness takes
the place of my repining. Thankfulness that it is as well with my beloved ones
as it is. Oh, that I could remove every burden, and make their pathway smooth
and flowery. I find most of our trials are imaginary, but none the less real
for being SO. For instance, my beloved wife's imagination pictures me on my
weary way back to old Virginia's blood-stained fields, subject to every
hardship, exposed to every danger, and her suffering could be no greater if it
were so. On the contrary, I am still in Kentucky, in a pleasant, shady grove,
enjoying a season of welcome quiet and repose, soft bread to eat, plenty of pure,
cold water to drink. What more could mortals crave. The newspapers were right,
as far as they went, about our being ordered to the Potomac. We did receive
such orders, but General Burnside telegraphed the War Department the Ninth
Corps had marched, during the year, an average of twenty miles a day; that it
had just returned from an exhausting campaign in Mississippi; that the men were
worn down by fatigue and sickness, and were unfit for active service, and asked
that they be allowed to remain here for a season. His request was granted. One
year has passed since I left my pleasant home to serve my country a year big
with the fate of millions yet unborn—a year the most eventful in our history;
perhaps in the world's history.
SOURCE: David Lane,
A Soldier's Diary: The Story of a Volunteer, 1862-1865, pp. 81-2
