Roswell Farnham to [Mary Farnham]
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Your letter of the 15th. & 16th. was received tonight when the boat came. I am
sorry to still hear that you are alone. It must not be so. You must get some one at
once. What are you thinking of to be alone so much. Even if Jane was well you ought
to have some older person in the house with you. Can you not get some one. Every
letter I get, I expect that the next one with be in some other handwriting telling me
that you are sick. I hope that you will not be until I get home. You must hold out if
possible till then. I hardly know what I shall do when I get home except to take care
of you. I shall feel rather dull for a while after the excitement of our short
campaign. I really begin to love this sort of life and could we come out a little
better prepared, we should not have any discomforts. I am perfectly well and healthy
and I suppose am about as black as some of the negroes altho' here none of us notice
it, we are all so tanned. The fleas and mosquitoes have bitten me pretty severely and
you know that I suffer a good deal from those things, but a salt water bath does me a
good deal of good and I have taken one every night for several days. John Prichard
and I went
down just after 9 o'clock and had a good bath tonight when there
was no one there. I feel cool and very much refreshed and shall sleep soundly. Four
of us are writing here. Lieut. Peckett is on guard tonight, and Blakely is up with
Maj. Worthen where he will probably stop tonight. I dont know when he will go to
Bradford. He talks some of starting tomorrow.
I am glad you was so prudent in respect to showing my letter. You did in respect to it just as I wished to have you. I wish to be mixed up with such things as little as possible.
I spoke about the spelling on your letter to call your attention to it. You sometimes spelled a word wrong when the very letter before it was right. You need not feel bad about it. It is not worth caring for. What made me think of it more particularly, was Mrs. Peckectt directed the package containing the Havelocks & she spelled Virginia, "Vaginia", and Peckett has hung up the piece of cloth on which the direction is written in the tent, and it now hangs here. So you see you are not the only one who makes mistakes. But you take so much blame to yourself when you make the slightest mistake that it makes you feel unhappy when you ought not to. You write very good letters indeed. They look as neat as any letters received here and you may be sure I shall find no fault with them.
Blakely has just come in from Maj. Worthens with half a pint of ice-cream which we
found delicious. You
may be sure we do not suffer either for the luxuries
or necessaries.
Yesterday Blakely, Worthen, myself and Henricus the adj't of the N. Y. 4th. rode out into the country about three miles. We called at two houses. At one, the owner, John Parish, was at home and has never been away. It was a sight to see the colored population around the house. Sat. Morning The little darkies were around with nothing but a ragged shirt to cover their nakedness, while the older ones were lazing around doing almost nothing. At the other house the owner was gone. He was a brother of the first; but had cleared out when we first came here. I went into the house but everything was gone. It was entirely stripped. The houses both of them were very cheaply built, and altho' both men owned about forty-five slaves each, worth probably $25,000, and their plantation in addition to that, they do not live half as comfortable as we do at home. We had a very pleasant ride & came home just before dinner.
What I meant about Uncle David's picking up things &c. was out doors. You know there was a pile of wood that was not sawed, and a great many little things that needed looking after. I was not thinking of things in doors. Laura has not written a word in relation to matters at home. She wrote me a long letter about her ears the other day which I shall try to answer sometime today.
I only wear one shirt - the red woolen one. The under shirt was so tight that I was
compelled to take it off. One
of them is large enough and that I shall keep
to wear when I want to wear a white shirt. I shall get along well enough, tho' if my
undershirts were large enough I should wear white shirts all the time.
There is something I want to say but I have now forgotten what it is. Breakfast is almost ready, but before the boat goes I will try and remember what it is.
Oh! I remember you ask me about my uniform &c. As Provost Marshall I have no greater pay nor higher rank than I did as Lieut. I am entitles to wear a different uniform if I choose. But I did not wish to be at an expense of forty or fifty dollars for a uniform. My old uniform looks rather rusty and I should have been pleases to wear a blue uniform, as it looks so much neater but I have got along so far without trouble. As to pay, I have my new duties in the place of my old ones. I recd a letter from Charlie Harding last night. I intended to write to Mr. Stebbins before this and shall write today if I can. At any rate I wish you would tell him that the hearing before the Commissioners will have to be deferred till some time in Aug. - Say the 15th. or 25th. would be better.
It is about time for the boat and I must close.
Write again soon & tell me all that is going on. There is all sort of talk about when we shall go home but nothing that we can depend upon. We are looking forward to Aug. 2d. as the time.
Your affectionate husbandRoswell Farnham