Diary of Corporal Alexander G. Downing: Friday, September 2, 1864

Cloudy and warm — threatened rain. No news.¹ I wrote two letters today, one to Lewis Elseffer and one to Mrs. Mary Ham, Iowa City, Iowa.

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1 On this day John Hilton of Company E was severely wounded in the right side at Lovejoy Station. This was the last day's fighting In the siege of Atlanta. Crocker's Iowa Brigade had been under fire eighty-one days out of the eighty-seven days of the siege — from June to September. — A. G. D.

Source: Alexander G. Downing, Edited by Olynthus B., Clark, Downing’s Civil War Diary, p. 213

Diary of Corporal Alexander G. Downing: Saturday, July 30, 1864

It is quite warm and sultry. We have a man in our ward who is very homesick; he sits on his cot and cries like a child. He has been promised a furlough, and I believe that if he could not get it he would die. All the wounded here able to take care of themselves on the way, are going home on thirty-day furloughs. Three from our company, Thomas R. McConnoll, John Zitler and John Hilton, are going. John Esher is not going until his wound gets better. A great many of the wounded men are dying, for the weather is so hot the wounds quickly mortify. No news from the front.

Source: Alexander G. Downing, Edited by Olynthus B., Clark, Downing’s Civil War Diary, p. 207-8