Publication InformationFlorence May 131862

Page 1

My Dear Marsh.

I have been very busy of late, or I should have replied to your letter sooner --

Mrs Marsh can come any time she likes before the 20th of June --

The news today, is most cheering. New Orleans--as good as taken, and all the forts destroyed -- I dont see how--after this, communications are to be kept up twixt Secessiondom--on the opposite banks of the Mississippi. Our forces will soon open the river the whole way and this will prove a fatal blow to the Rebels --

They have burned their cotton to the value of $14,000000 -- I wish they would burn the rest of it throughout the South, and if the Traitors would get on top of it, while in flames--it would be still better --

I hope that Mc:Lellan will redeem his reputation--by some good generalship, for it cannot be denied, that he stands below par just now,--but we should consider how much he has had to do--to -- I am not disposed to judge him yet, but give him a trial in the field -- It would be a serious thing to be defeated at York Town--but that would not ruin us -- It would teach us another

lesson of the South--and those Congressmen who want to reduce the army, that they are fools --

I find it hard to wait for news. The plot thickens so fast, that one stands almost on tip toe for the signal -- I hardly think of any thing else --

I do not believe that England and France will interfere for the present -- They would do it quick enough if they thought us unable to oppose a stout resistance -- They will wait in the hope of our being crippled like Mexico -- The leaders--and letters of the Times are charming! -- I hope we shall never forget them -- or indeed the entire course of England in regard to us -- The Turkey cock of nations--who never attacks an equal enemy if he can help it, but is always at hand to take advantage of any fight that may be going on in the farm yard -- I have seen one of those fowls, strutting about a pair of fighting bantams--and picking at both of them--as he could find an opportunity -- This was not to make peace--for his own feathers were up--all the while --

All well, and all send love to you and Mrs Marsh.

Yours truly,

Will Mrs Marsh please allow her Maid to get 4 metres more of the same Silk--as enclosed?

[The following lines in italics are by Elizabeth Gibson Powers]

References in this letter:

After running his fleet of twenty-four ships past Forts Jackson and St. Philip at the mouth of the Mississippi river, Flag Officer David Farragut took New Orleans, the Confederacy's largest city, on April 25, 1862. Three days later the forts, which had been subject to a week-long bombardment before Farragut's dash, surrendered also.

General George B. McClellan, moving northward toward Richmond from Fort Monroe, Virginia, along the peninsula between the York and James rivers, laid siege to Confederate fortifications near Yorktown from April 5 to May 4, 1862, when they were abandoned by their defenders.

Carrie Marsh Crane, Caroline Marsh's niece, daughter of her brother Thomas, accompanied the Marshs for a number of years during his tenure as minister to Italy. She died in a shipwreck in 1874.