(excerpts)
“June 11th and 14th.
“We are still at the Spotswood Hotel but I don’t know whether we shall continue very long. The President and his family will move next week to the place selected for them. I hear it is very handsome and the City Council has bought and put it at the disposal of the Government. They have also given Mrs. Davis the use of a nice carriage and horses and seem disposed to do all they can to show their joy at the exchange from Montgomery. . . . So far all is quiet here and I can yet scarcely realize that we are at war, actually.
“I drove out with Mrs. Davis yesterday to one of the Camp grounds and it was really a beautiful, though rather sad sight to me, to see them drill and go through with their manœuvres, Poor fellows! how many will never return to their homes! . . . There are several camp grounds in the neighborhood, and people throng them every afternoon and unless you engage a carriage in the morning, it is very hard to procure one.”