MY DEAR GIRLS, Charles has enlisted. It was at a war-meeting at the town-hall last evening. You have known his feelings, and perhaps will not be surprised. I did not expect it, and must confess I was very much shaken in spirit by it. But, arriving through some sleepless hours at a calmer mood, I do not know that it is any greater sacrifice than we as a family ought to make.
Although it will throw a great deal of care upon me, and there is all this extra work to do, yet, that excepted, perhaps he could not go at any better time than now. [261] It is for the winter, and nine months is a fitter term for a family man, circumstanced as he is, than three years; and this enlistment precludes all liability to future draft. This is in the key of prudence; but I do think that men with young families dependent upon them should be the last to go. And yet I had rather have in C. the patriotic spirit that impels him, than all the prudence in the world.
To the Same.
Oct. 16, 1862.
C. is steadily and calmly putting all things into order that he can. . . . He came in the morning after he had enlisted, and said to me with a bright, vigorous, and satisfied expression of countenance, "Well, you see what I have done." I believe some people have been very much stirred and moved by his decision. It is said to have given an impulse to the recruiting, and the quota, I am told, is now about full and there will be no drafting here.
Thinking of these things,—thinking of all possible good or ill to come, your mother and I go about, from hour to hour, sometimes very much weighed down, and sometimes more hopeful and cheerful; and poor J., with the tears ready to come at every turn, is yet going on very bravely and well. . . . Cassidy is to look after barn-yard, etc., for the winter.
But all this is nothing. Good heaven! do people know, does the world know, what we are doing, when we freely send our sons from peaceful and happy homes to meet what camp-life, and reconnoissances, and battles may bring to them and us? God help and pity us!
[262] To Mrs. David Lane.
SHEFFIELD, Dec. 19, 1862.
DEAR FRIEND,—I wrote to Mrs. Curtis [FN]last Saturday, before I knew what had befallen her, and in that letter sent a message to you, to know of your whereabouts, provided you were still in town. I don't expect an answer from her now, of course, though I have written her since; but thinking that you are probably in New York, I write.