Jane Stuart Woolsey to Joseph Howland. Saturday Evening, January, ‘62. I received yesterday from Mr. Stephen Williams thirty dollars, on the part of Mr. Alexander Van Rensselaer, “for a soldiers’ library.” Stephen, good old soul, said, “ Oh! I’ve got this commission; now won’t you help me? I don’t know about libraries; you can consult [...]
January. Dear Girls: I have only been waiting for the New Year to come fairly in and shut the door, before sitting down quietly to wish you all the traditionary compliments of the season. . . . We all spent Christmas day together as usual in London Terrace. . . . The prettiest feature of [...]
Abby Howland Woolsey to Georgeanna and Eliza. December 26. Dear Girls: We had a great day yesterday. Of course, Mother and the girls and Charley broke through the rule we had prescribed for ourselves, not to give Christmas presents, and launched upon Jane and me wholly unprepared, a flood of pretty and useful things. . [...]
Eliza’s Journal:Christmas Day we spent with Joseph again in camp, going round by Alexandria to pick up Chaplain Hopkins and take him with us. We had taken some goodies and little traps with us for the men in the hospitals in Alexandria and were glad to find the nice arrangements that had already been made [...]
Mother to Georgeanna and Eliza. Monday, December 24, 1861. My dear Girls: Col. D. is a godsend! I was in despair at the thought of not getting some little Christmas box off so as to reach you to-morrow, when lo! he appeared, like an angel of mercy and offered to take anything we might have [...]
Francis Bacon to Georgeanna Muirson Woolsey. Tybee Island, Dec. 24, ‘61. You speak of our hospital as a matter of course; and we are, by and by, to have one, as yet uncommenced; but we owe the medical department no thanks for this when we get it. Dr. Cooper, Medical Director of the expedition, a [...]
December ‘61. Dear Girls: “We are in the midst of stirring times,” as the newspapers say–or rather, stirring times are in our midst, as well as all around us. I am prepared to be astonished at nothing, and to regard all events with stoicism bordering on a fiendish glee. New York was sizzling on Monday [...]
Abby Howland Woolsey to Georgeanna and Eliza. December 6th. If Mr. Craney thought the bundle of hair was a feather-bed, he will certainly think that the stocking box, when it arrives, is the bedstead following on. . . . Let me describe its contents. In the first place, E’s cheque bought seven dozen and a [...]
Thursday Evening, December 5. My dear Girls: This will be a little Sunday greeting to you, probably, as I write it merely to give you my love, and your address to Mr. Charles Johnson of Norwich. He is now here spending the evening, and, as usual, very entertaining. He leaves to-morrow for Washington. He goes [...]
Ebbitt House, December 1, ‘61 We saw yesterday a nice dodge for enlarging your tent and making the back one more private. It is pitching the two tents three or four feet apart and spreading the fly over the intermediate vestibule. Chaplain Edward Walker of the 4th Connecticut, whom we went to see yesterday, had [...]
December 1st. L. came in a few evenings ago. He was at Conway last summer, and able to contradict an absurd story that was going the rounds,–that Charley and Joe having joined the army, Mother had given up housekeeping and gone into the hospitals, and all the daughters were children of the regiment! Dr. Carmalt [...]
The Governors of all the loyal states issued in these dark days their annual proclamation of a day of Thanksgiving. Governor Andrews’ of Massachusetts was dated Nov. 21,’61, “the anniversary of the day on which the Pilgrims of Massachusetts on board the Mayflower united themselves in a solemn compact of government: ‘Sing aloud unto God our [...]
November 25. We have been evacuating the British with great zest to-day; good weather, clean streets, and many praises for the 22nd, Charley’s regiment, among other battalions–praises, that is, with the exception of some vile youths of the street, near Stuart’s, who shouted “hurrah for the never go ‘ways!” . . . We had a [...]
November. Bessie Wolcott’s wedding came off very brilliantly. Carry went out to Astoria the day before. Mother and Hatty drove out together. Mary is said to have looked very handsome in white silk trimmed with black lace and white silk ruches. Hatty wore her crimson silk with white valencienne spencer or waist, and mother was [...]
Jane Stuart Woolsey to Georgeanna and Eliza. New York, November, 1861. Dear Girls: I went to the provisional Hospital here to see if the volunteers wanted anything. Mrs. Darragh took me all over, and said she wanted woolen shirts and socks very much. So I sent the requisition to the society and she will get [...]
Caroline Carson Woolsey to Eliza. Nov. 18th. Dear Eliza: Your most delightful letter has just been read aloud amid the cheers of the assembled family. What a splendid time you are having with your brigadiers and serenades. How I should like to sacrifice myself and join you in a few of your “noble” sprees, and [...]
The battle of Ball’s Bluff near Poolesville had taken place while we were on “leave of absence” at home, and on our return to Washington, Major Potter, U. S. paymaster, and his wife, starting on an expedition to pay the troops up the Potomac, invited Chaplain Hopkins and ourselves to join the party, which we [...]
8 Brevoort Pl., Thursday. The details of the landing of the fleet at Port Royal fill all minds and mouths. I hope Georgy will have, from “our own correspondent” with the expedition, a full account of the landing of the 7th Connecticut, which seems to have been the first on shore. The sight of those [...]
Tybee Island. The 7th was the first regiment ashore in South Carolina. It made the first reconnoissance in force; a detachment of five companies occupied Braddock’s Point and its batteries, and was the first to reconnoitre Daufuskie and neighboring islands. The greater part of the regiment now holds this position, with a fragmentary German one. [...]
Ebbitt House, Washington, Nov. 11 It is very late, but I scribble a line before going to bed to say we got over safely from camp, stopping on the way for Mr. Hopkins, who is going to Poolesville with us to-morrow. We got in at six o’clock and since then we have been in a [...]
Joe went back to the army at the end of his week’s furlough, G. and E. staying in New York a fortnight longer with Mother. On returning to Washington they found that General Scott had just resigned from the head of the army, Nov. 1, ‘61, and General McClellan had been appointed commander-in-chief. They began [...]
Hampton Roads, Oct. 27th. We still loiter here in a seeming imbecile way, waiting now for weather and now for nobody knows what. Meanwhile patience and strength are ebbing in twelve thousand men. The condition of some of the regiments on shipboard is said to be very bad. Ours is fortunate in its ship, and [...]
Francis Bacon to Georgeanna Muirson Howland (his future wife). Camp Walton, Annapolis, Oct. 18th, ‘61. Pardon a wretched notelet, written on camp stationery with the very dregs of the day’s ration of nervous energy. Everybody is both tired and busy to-night with this embarkation business. . . . You will readily believe they are sober [...]
Rev. Edward Walker to Georgeanna Muirson Woolsey. Hdqrs. 4th Reg. C. V., Camp Ingalls. Dear Miss Woolsey: Your kind note is just received. A week ago our hospital was in wretched condition, but, thanks to the Sanitary Commission! we are at present provided with nearly everything we want. If anything is needed, it is a [...]
Mother to Eliza Woolsey Howland at Fishkill. New York, Thursday, Oct. 17th. My dear Eliza: I must write a line to you this afternoon, not only to congratulate you and dear Joe upon being together again in your own pleasant home but to tell you how charmed I am at the prospect of seeing you [...]