“AT MRS. OVERTON’S,
“Six Miles from Nashville,
“On Columbia Turnpike,
“Dec. 5th, 1864.
“I wrote you a short note from the other side of Franklin the morning after the battle. I have not written oftener because I have been unwilling to trust letters to the mail, as I suppose communication has been interrupted between Macon and Augusta. We left Florence, Alabama, on the 21st of November; we reached Columbia and after remaining in front of the place two or three days it was evacuated by the enemy who then took position on the north bank of Duck River, immediately opposite the town. There was some artillery firing and sharp shooting across the river and it was in this on the 28th that Col. Beckham was wounded. I have not heard from him since the morning of the 1st. when he was doing well, but the wound is so severe (the skull fractured) that I fear he will not recover. In fact the surgeon said there was a bare possibility of his surviving. His loss will be very severely felt. It is hard enough to be killed at all, but to be killed in such an insignificant affair makes it doubly bad.
“The fight at Franklin was very severe—while it lasted, and though our loss was heavy, everybody is in the finest humor—and ready for the fight again whenever Gen. ‘John B.’ gives the word. Col. Cofer, Provost Marshall Gen. of the Army, told me the other day that he had taken particular pains to find out by enquiring the feelings of the men and that the morale of the army was very much improved by the fight, and that the men would go into the next with double vim and impetuosity.
“Our men fought with the utmost determination and if we had had three hours more of daylight I feel as confident as possible that we should have been to-day in Nashville. The Yankees are now in their works around the city and our main line is at one point only twelve hundred yards from theirs. We have captured three engines and about twenty cars and I hope before long to hear the shriek of the locomotive once more. The country we have marched through for the past fifty miles is one of the gardens of the world. The lands are very fertile, the plantations well improved and the people before the war were in the possession of every comfort and luxury. The destruction, too, caused by the Yankees, is not to be compared to that in other sections occupied by them. There has been no part of the Confederacy that I have seen which has been in their possession and has suffered so little.
“Our Army, in leaving Tennessee, on both occasions previously, passed to the East of this portion of the state, so that an Army has never before marched over it. The Yankees too have held it a long time and I imagine considered it permanently in their possession. We reached this place on the night of the 2nd. There are several young ladies from Nashville here who are very pretty and agreeable and the most intense Southerners. The enemy was forced from his position north of Duck River by a flank movement which placed the whole army except, two Divisions, near his communications. He fell back to Franklin that night and the next day, the 30th November, was the battle of Franklin.
“Dec. 8th. I have heard this morning of poor Beckham’s death. What a cruel, hard thing is war! The individual suffering, however, is the public gain. Over the road, on which moved Cheatham’s Corps, was hung, just at the Tennessee State line, an inscription in these words: ‘Tennessee, A grave, or a free home.’ A good many graves have been already filled—but better we should all meet that fate than fail to gain the prize we struggle for. As he passed over the line, Gen. Hood received a formal welcome into the state from Governor Harris, who has been with us since we took up the line of march for Tennessee. If we can gain Nashville, what a glorious termination it will be for the campaign. Even if we fail in this, for I fear the fortifications are too strong, and hold the enemy in his lines round the city, it will be one of the grandest achievements an army has ever performed. Think of it! Starting from Lovejoy’s thirty miles beyond Atlanta on the 18th Sept., here we are on the 8th Dec. in front of Nashville with the enemy cooped up in his works and the fruits of two years hard marching and fighting lost to him. . . .
“Dec. 11. There was communion service held at the house this morning. Dr. Quintard officiated and prayer was offered up for the Confederate Congress for the first time publicly in this country, I suppose, since our army retreated from the state. It is bitterly cold. Fortunately the troops are lying quiet and can have their fires to keep warm by. I feel, I assure you, for the poor fellows in the skirmish line in such weather.
“In each brigade a detail has been set at work making shoes for the barefooted men from leather obtained in the country. They are making some twenty pairs a day in each brigade, and in addition, there is a large supply coming from the rear, so you see we are getting on finely.
“The Quartermasters and Commissaries too are hard at work getting other supplies and the R. R. is in operation from Pulaski to Franklin. We have gotten into a real land of plenty and I sincerely trust we shall never leave the State except it be to enter Kentucky. I don’t believe myself that the Yankees will allow us to enter Winter Quarters, even should we desire it, without a fight. Of course, in order to make a fight they must leave their entrenchments, and if they attack us in ours or allow us to attack them without works, I feel not the slightest fear of the result. . . . ”
(Note: picture is of an unidentified Confederate soldier.)