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

Diary of Corporal Alexander G. Downing: Saturday, June 25, 1864

We remained out in the rifle pits till this evening, when we were relieved by the Fifteenth Iowa. John Esher was shot through the face this afternoon by a rebel sharpshooter. The shot was fired through one of the “portholes” under the head log of our defenses, where he was at the time loading his gun. The ball struck his jaw bone, knocking out some of his teeth, but it is thought that he will recover.¹ There is no news from Richmond.

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¹ Esher said to me, “I'm going to see what I'm shooting at,” and walked up to peer through the porthole, when all of a sudden a ball crashed in, knocking him down, and as he fell back his heels kicked up. He was right by my side when he was struck and as he fell he cried out. “Oh, boys, I'm killed!” After he recovered, we laughed a great deal over it, at his expense, for he thought that now he was really Killed. But although Esher recovered from the wound, yet he was deformed for life. His head was drawn down on the side of the wound, since the cords of the neck were shorter than on the other side. — A. G. D.

Source: Alexander G. Downing, Edited by Olynthus B., Clark, Downing’s Civil War Diary, p. 201

Diary of Alexander G. Downing: Sunday, January 11, 1863

We received orders to be ready to march early in the morning for Memphis. The report in camp is that we are to go on down the Mississippi river. The Fourth Brigade of the Third Division came in at 5 o'clock in the evening and relieved our brigade. A detail from the Eighty-first Illinois Infantry furnished the picket guards to relieve our post where I was on guard with Corporal McBirney and Privates John Esher and George Eicher, all of my company. We are all glad to leave this place, as it is low, damp and unhealthy, which with the smallpox makes it a bad camp.

Source: Alexander G. Downing, Edited by Olynthus B., Clark, Downing’s Civil War Diary, p. 93