If the Fifth Regiment are coming down to help us I wish they would come along. I have got tired of standing guard every other day as regularly as days come around. We hear they are not having as good a time at home as we did. I had rather be out here than to be cooped up as they are, right at their homes and yet not permitted to spend their time there.
Sunday Evening, September 20.
The Governor, Jack Hale and Dan. Clark were down here yesterday and made speeches to a crowd at headquarters. Hale said we would probably stay here until we are discharged, and that we had not got much longer to serve.
CXIII
Point Lookout, Md., September 28, 1863.
NOW I can answer your question as to what I think has become of George Slade. This very minute I have received a letter from him, dated at Camp Parole, Annapolis. He has just got in from Richmond, where he has been a prisoner at Belle Isle.
I am going to burn just four inches of candle. When not on duty the boys have fine times boating and fishing. As soon as we got off guard today I went a-fishing with two other fellows, and did not get back till the middle of the afternoon. We had a grand time and poor luck. I got only three.
There was a great naval disaster last Saturday. Steve Smiley and three or four other bold mariners have been fitting up a boat that was intended to be the boss of the fleet. Saturday, with a stiff breeze blowing, they set out for a sail. They went down the river in grand style and out into the bay. There was an injudicious combination of a cranky boat, too much sail and too much wind, and the first thing they knew the boat was bottom side up with care and the crew afloat on the fierce rolling tide. A gunboat sent a boat to pick them up, and they returned to camp wiser and wetter men.