These letters which
were written prior to, during and after the war, together with miscellany are
self explanatory.
Evansville, Ind.
Dec. 30th, 1860
DEAR SISTER:
I take my pen in hand
for the first time in my life to inform you how I am getting along, at present.
I have had a hard
spell of sickness. I am as saucy as
ever. I am going to school now to get
my education for I ‘m going to make a drayman of myself.
I am going to send my kisses
to you, and hope to come see you. Tell Fletcher that I want to see him, for he
must be a man by this time.
Excuse this bad
writing and spelling, for now I must bring my script of paper to a close.
Give my best respects
to each and all.
Yours truly,
G.M. KIRKPATRICK.
* * * * *
“Washington"
Evansville, Ind.
"Why dont you
take it?" Dec. 15th, 1861
Miss M. J. Kirkpatrick.
DEAR SISTER:
I take my pen in hand
to let you know that I am well at present, and have been well since I left
home.
I like a soldier's
life better every day. We had a muddy
time of it coming up here. The mud was
knee deep. We camped three times.
I have told the boys
I would like to go farther away from here as there is a fine camping ground in
view.
(Les Laurence is now
sailing in the door of my tent.)
We have fine times
here, drilling all day. We have
fireplaces in the tents, which makes them warm, and there is plenty of straw in
my tent.
I have only been on
double duty three times since leaving Henderson. I have been in the guard house but once since enlisting.
Leslie L. send his
regards to all. He is fat and saucy and
more devilish than ever. He says he
wishes he could get home Christmas.
George Deats sends
best regards to Julia, and says he is going to get married as soon as the war
is over.
I like this place first rate. There are about one thousand troops
here. I broke a tube in my gun and
Liuet. Ohlmstead sent Luke down town to get it fixed. He allowed it would cost about 30c out of my pocket money.
I would really like
to come home Christmas. I often think
about Dad. Here I do as I please, and
if they don’t like it they can take less of it.
Our Captain is going
to be our Chaplin. Ohlmstead is
Captain; Timble, our first Lieutenant, and our second Lieutenant is not
elected.
Give my best to all
the good looking girls there, and tell them that I expect to get home some
time. So no more at present.
Yours very truly,
GEORGE KIRKPATRICK
(it is time for dress
parade).
Write soon. I am glad to hear from Dad.
* * * * *
Shelbyville, Tenn. April 6th, 1862
DEAR SISTER:
I take my pen in hand
to let you know that I am well and hope that this finds you in that state of
health. I received your letter
yesterday and was glad to hear from you and the folks.
I have not got tired
of soldiering yet and don’t think that I Will.
We are now at Shelbyville, about 60 miles from Nashville. When I last wrote you I did not know that
were going to leave so soon, and I said
that I was going over to see Bill. An
soon as I sealed the letter, I went up to the Cook’s tent, and there sat Bill.
I hardly knew him as
he is so fat. He said they had a hard
time coming from Louisville, through the mud.
We had a pretty hard
time coming here from Nashville, -and went out the road toward Alabama. After we were five miles from town we had
orders to go back, and so we went back and, started for Murfreesboro, thirty
miles distant.
We stayed there about
three weeks, and the last week Co. "A" had to go ten miles toward
Nashville to guard a Railroad bridge.
We were there seven
days and we eat a barrel of potatoes every day.
Then orders came that
our regiment was to start from there at one o'clock. We had to catch up with the others who had ten miles the start of
us. We started to Shelbyville, thirty
miles away and reached within ten miles of it that day, and made it the next
day.
It is one of the prettiest towns I ever saw. I don’t think that we will stay here long for we will go about
a hundred miles the next trip.
You want to know what
I want done with my money, I want Dad to use it until I get ready for it, and I
don’t know how song that will be.
Tell Dad I want to
come home and see the folks, but that I am not as keen about it as he said I
would be. He said I "would be
tired of soldiering inside of a week." Well that week has not come yet.
One more thing! You must tell Jule to write as I wrote last.
No more at present.
I remain your
affectionate brother,
GEORGE M. KIRKPATRICK
* * * * *
Ringold, Ga.
May 6, 1862
DEAR SISTER:
It is with pleasure
that I write you…..
Well we have got out
to the front, and the Rebs are doing well.
I think it will not be long before we will enter their lines aid try
their constitutions and see what they are made of, and for the last time. We
would have stayed at Chattanooga but when our Colonel came to
the regiment, (I refer to McIntire) he
told the General that his regiment should not work at such a job, so they sent
us out to the front, and here we are.
There are plenty of
Yankees-150,000 of them and that is quite a good many-quite a squad-and I think
that they will clean out the Rebs this summer.
They don’t take any
more prisoners now, and they kill all they get, and we do the same. That will end the war quicker than anything
else.
I liked to have got
killed about a week ago. I tell you it was hard. I was running after one of the boys, and I fell into a grave and
I liked to have dug one for myself. I
have not done any duty since.
We have a nice camp ground. We are camping on Chickamauga Creek, and it
is a nice little town. The Rebs are in
sight, but every thing is all right. I
hope we may be able to clean up the whole of them this summer.
Give my best respects
to each and all, I remain your brother, until death.
GEORGE M.
KIRKPATRICK.
* * * * *
"On to
Shiloh"
Fayettsville, Tenn.
May 11, 1862
DEAR SISTER:
I......... am well
and hope this finds you in the same state of health.
The weather is fair
here, but the sun is so hot that when I am on guard I can light my pipe in the
sun. Today is Sunday there is preaching
here.
I am sitting on the
bank of Elk River in the shade now, feel too lazy to walk. This is a bad place for sickness. Our, regiment cannot turn out over 150 men
or 200 men to fight.
Captain Atchison went
to Huntsville for the mail and it had been taken by Secesh, so I expect that
the letter I sent you has gone to Dixie for 90 days. I sent all the news in it.
Tell Christ Granli
that he will see a different boy when, I come me home. I do not drink beer or whiskey nor any other
kind of stuff. . . . . Tell Dad that I am not tired of soldiering, and I think
I can stand it as long as any of the rest of his sons can.
Give my best respects
to all inquiring friends.
I remain your truly
until death.
GEORGE M. KIRKPATRICK.
* * * * *
Fayettsville,
Tenn.
May 9, 1862
DEAR SISTER:
I take my pen in hand
to inform you that I am well at present.
………..I have not
received your letter as we stayed at Shelbyville, and the division went on to
Huntsville. When the mail came, it went
on to the division. They do not want to
sort the mail here.
After I wrote you,
half of our regiment had a fight out at Wartrace. We have moved on thirty miles toward Dixie, and I am glad. The rest of our division had a large fight
and we will be in it pretty soon, for we have marching orders for
Huntsville. I guess we will get a
little mud as we go forty miles in hilly land, climbing up and down, packing
our knapsacks.
I have had the fever
but am well now. Our company is in town
as a police guard, and I am at camp.
The first I heard of Bob being home vas from Jule's letter, which by
chance, I happened to get by first nail which we got since I wrote you...........I will tell you the
reason why I wrote-I want you to get me a dollar's worth of postage stamps and
I will pay you for them when the war is over, or sooner. Be sure to send them, for I gave a dime for
this one stamp, and could hardly get it at that price.
You need not send any
envelopes nor paper as I have plenty.
Stamps are all that I want and I will write you every day. Tell Alec to write, and tell me everything
for I am keen to hear from Indiana.
Best respects to all,
for I don’t care whether I get home or no any more. I remain your obedient servant.
GEORGE M. KIRKPATRICK.
Miss M. J.
Kirkpatrick:
I was glad to get
your letter and to hear from home, the first time for a long, long, time. I have had good health, generally speaking
ever since coming to Tennessee.
I like soldiering
very well yet. We had a very good march
from Fayettsville to here (Huntsville).
We are encamped about a half mile from town. This is the prettiest town I ever saw. It is as big as Evansville.
Our company and two more went down the Tennessee River, and we had some fun. We crossed the river and went five miles on the Cedar Mountain to hunt the Secesh. We could not find any though so we got some hams and shoulders of meat and chickens and came back.
We stayed there three
days. There has been a fight, where we
crossed the river. We are back at camp,
now. I think we get paid off tomorrow,
and I expect to send a little money home......I will send home all that I can
spare.
We can’t get
provision very easy now. We have to
haul it sixty miles.
We have not been in a
fight lately. I was surely sorry to
hear that Bob was wounded and had to come home Tell Bob that I wish he had a
new eye, and that gun of his and that he was in his old regiment!
Then that would help
to put the war right through. My
respects to one and all. So no more
now. I remain your brother until death.
GEORGE KIRKPATRICK.
to M. J.,
Kirkpatrick.
* * * * *
"Our gunboat boys"
Huntsville, Alabama.
August 11, 1862.
DEAR SISTER:
I am well. I was glad to get your letter and to hear
from home. I was on prevost guard
yesterday. I tell you we have had a hard time.
We have been living
on half rations for about a month, but that do not make me “tired of
soldering.”
O yes! I saw Bill
Kirk about a month age. His division
passed through here and stayed awhile.
I saw John and Ben Massey and all the Gardgels out of the fifth
regiment. Bill told me to send his best
respects to you and all the folks.
We have been living
on corn and chickens and peaches all the time and apples are plentiful. We don’t have to work, for things are
different and negroes do the work and we are getting to eat.
The boys would like
to have a discharge to get home to see their mammies. I would to, if I knew it would crush the rebellion. I am a better soldier than you perhaps
think. You may think I am in the guard
house every day, but that is not so. I
am just as good a boy for behaving as you can find. I have never missed a guard yet, and am on guard every other day.
It is so awful hot
here that you can mix up flour and lay it in the sun and it will bake quicker
than if you put it into the oven. We
don’t need fire any more, we cook all by the sun.
Tell all the folks in
the country I want to see them and talk to them about this war, and get them to enlist, for this is worst time in the
world.
Well now, Martha give
my best respects to all the girls and boys and tell them I am the same old
George and always intend to be.
I remain your affectionate brother, until death.
GEORGE M. KIRKPATRICK.
* * * * *
"The Whole Union
Forever."
Perryville, Kentucky
Oct. 9th, 1861(2?)
On the march through Kentucky.
DEAR SISTER:
I received your letter
at Louisville, but had no time to write there.
Now we are one hundred and five miles from Louisville. We had a little fight back here a piece and
lost heaps of men.
Our captain was
killed, also three men, Jack Riggs was one of them. It was a terrible time for us, and in all we lost 3000 men and 90
men were either killed or wounded in our division.
I heard many a ball
whistle past my ear, and one of them took off my hat rim. Still I was not scared; I shot away 52
cartridges.
Tell Dad I am not
tired of soldiering. There were about
twelve wounded in our company, four killed, and four taken prisoners and
paroled, but I escaped. I want to tell
you I made the Secesh Jump!
Cook sends his best
respects, and says he is glad he got out safely. Tell Bob I've seen the elephant, so no more at present.
I remain your brother
until death. (In haste)
GEORGE KIRKPATRICK.
* * * * *
"Major General Curtis." Nashville,
Tenn.
December 6, 1862
DEAR SISTER:
I seat myself once
more to write you a few lines to let you know how I am getting along and hope
that these few lines find you well also.
We are camped on the
Cumberland River, and do not know how long we will stay here. I think we will have a hard time this
winter.
I wish I might have
been at the party. I would have felt
like fighting two years longer in this war........... I am glad you got so much
wood cut.
There are so many
soldiers here; but in the most desolate place in the country, between Bowling
Green and here. There is not even a
fence rail to be seen, and pretty nearly every house is burned down. But I will say one thing again, and that is
"I am not tired of soldiering yet," and that is one thing that I will
stick to, but I am coming home this winter if nothing happens.
There are stirring times here at Nashville. We have had a long march since we left here, and expert to have
another one before we get home. I think
if the President does free the negroes, we will get home, for the men will not
fight for the negroes.
Give my best to all
the girls and folks. I remain, your
brother until death,
GEORGE M. KIRKPATRICK
* * * * *
“The Eagle and Stars Nashville, Tenn.
And Stripes”
December 20, 1862
DEAR SISTER:
I am with my
regiment……..four miles from Nashville.
I want you to send me a Christmas gift. You may send it by express. I will remember you someday when I can do so.
There is someone of
the regiment there at Nashville who will get it to me, so Martha, you and Julia and all please fix up a box of
good stuff, and send it as quick as you can to me, won’t you? When I get my
pay, I will send you double what it cost you to send it. All the boys are
hoping for a box like that from home.
Remember, Martha, I
will be looking for the box. I wonder
if you received the ten dollars I sent home from Green River, Rolling
Fork? I sent it last payday.
I must close now, and
remain your brother "until death,”
GEORGE M. KIRKPATRICK
* * * * *
"Ohio.
Murfreesboro, Tenn.
"E Pluribus
Unum." March 8,
1862(3?)
DEAR SISTER:
I was glad to hear
from you, and that Dad had sold the place.
We have had our pay, and I can not send much home to you, for we had to
settle for all of our clothing this time.
We are working on the
breastworks now and we cannot tell how long we will be here. Please write soon and tell me whether bad
got a place or not.
I will send a little money to you for a
present.
I remain your brother, until death.
GEORGE M. KIRKPATRICK.
* * * * *
The Eagle and Flag. Huntsville,
Alabama
"UNION."
June, 1863
DEAR SISTER:
I like this place
very much. Since I wrote you, our company has been out on picket ten day-just
got in, and are going in the morning.
We received our pay
yesterday……….Stone and I have been partners since we joined at Camp
Vanderburg. He wants to buy him a new
watch and I think I will lend some money to him.
There is not much
stirring here just now………I kept my coat and everything I had, and I am going to
send my dress coat home, and also a pair of trousers. I want you to lay them away in the drawer and have them for me,
and I will get my likeness taken, and send to you.
I have no time to
write for we are under arms and have been for twenty-four hours. We are called minute men, and we have to be
ready at a moment's notice, night and day to go anywhere we are called. We had to sleep last night with our
accoutrements on, and knapsacks rolled up.
So no more at
present, from your brother until death,
GEORGE M.
KIRKPATRICK.
P.S. Give my respects to all my friends.
* * * * *
Deckerd, Tenn.
August 5, 1863
DEAR SISTER:
…………..Sorry to hear
that Alfred was not able to help himself, being so low. Nothing to do now but drill a little at
present……………Bill is camped about a mile from here. He is well and so is John.
……….I think we will not stay here long for the cars are running to the Tennessee River and I thing (think?) we will move shortly. There is a call for some regulars, and if they get only up in our regiment, I am going.
They get $100 bounty,
and $13 a month. If I go, I will go in
battery, and they will fill up the old regiment with conscripts. Then the "Forty-Second" will be a
pretty regiment with conscripts in it.
They will not let
anybody in unless he has been in the service six months. What money I sent home was not very
much. Dad can go to the express office
to get it.
Closing I remaining
your brother until death.
GEORGE M.
KIRKPATRICK.
Co. A. 42nd
Indiana
1st Brig. 2nd Div. 14
Army Cumberland.
* * * * *
Town on Lookout
Mountain. Trenton,
Georgia
Oct. 5, 1863
DEAR SISTER:
. . . . .We left
Stevens and went to the River and crossed it, marching six miles after
dusk. We camped on the river, and got
up next morning and went up opposite Bridgeport and camped there. Next morning we started up the mountain, and
were all day going up.
We camped there, and had to go two miles after water. The mountain is so steep that you could throw a rock down and hear it going for an hour.
Next morning we
marched about ten miles across the mountain and camped for the night. That morning we helped the wagons down the
mountain and camped about seven o'clock.
There is only our
division on this road. Our Brigade went
out to have a scout for the Rebs. They
are not far distant and I expect that we will have some fighting to do. There is no telling what rout we will take,
but I think we will try to outflank them at Chattanooga.
We are not far from
the Atlanta Railroad. All the boys are
well and in good spirits. We have to
pack our knapsacks over the mountains.
That is nothing. I would rather
march than lay in camp for weeks. We
can get to see some of the country this way. There is nothing but timber
here……Write soon and direct to
GEORGE M. KIRKPATRICK.
Co. A 42nd Regmt Ind. Vols.
1st Brig. 2nd Division 14th A. C.
* * * * *
Chattanooga,
Tenn.
Oct. 15th,
1863
"The U. S.
Christian Commissions sends this as the soldier’s messenger to his home. Let it hasten to those who wait for
tidings. Soldiers letter……….Chaplain U.
S. A."
DEAR SISTER:
I did not hear from
you for four weeks. I wondered what was
the matter…….We have had a hard time of it since I last wrote you. We have been in a fight, but I suppose you
have heard about it, before now.
I had the luck to
escape this time, but there are lots of the boys who did not...........Short
was one, and three other sergeants also.
We do not know whether Cook was killed or not. There were eighteen out
of our company that are missing.
We have been working
on fortifications since being here, and have been on a foraging
expedition. We had to go forty miles to
get corn, and it was hard to get at that.
We have scarcely anything to eat, but I am well and all the boys are in
good spirits.
They are
consolidating the brigades. They have
put our bridge in the 1st division, 14th A.C.
The 20th and 21st A.C. are put together which
makes the 4th A.C. now, and Gordon S. Granger commands.
Now I must stop
writing. BUT TELL DAD I AM NOT TIRED OF
SOLDIERING!
I remain your
brother,
GEORGE M. KIRKPATRICK.
* * * * *
Chattanooga, Tenn.
Nov. 2, 1863
DEAR SISTER:
I take this
opportunity to write you to let you know that I am still alive, but that is
about all, for we get nothing to eat worth mentioning. I have got down so weak that I can’t do my
duty any more, and the horses and mules are dying off at the rate of two
hundred a day. So are the soldiers.
The rations I drew
today were one cracker and a half, one half spoonful of coffee, and a little
piece of meat for two days. That was
all I got and I could sit down and eat all of it and not have half enough. Now when it gets down to that small rations,
it seems to me the Army is pretty near gone up. I cannot do my duty on such rations.
The Rebels hold Lookout Mountain.
We can’t get boats up with grub.
We are surrounded by Rebels and they have captured all our mules and
trains. Six mules, 60,000 men and six
women comprise our force, and NOTHING to eat!
When we get Lookout
Moutain, we will be able to get boats up.
Then Hooker is coming up on the other side, of the River. He has been fighting three or four days
trying to get the mountain. That is
pretty hard to do, for it is four miles high, and the Confederates have siege guns on the top of it.
Sister Martha, it is
pretty hard, but I have to stand it. I
love this country as well as any man ever did.
While at first I came out for the adventure of it, in a way, for I
thought that soldiering was so nice at Camp Vanderburg on the old fair ground in Evansville. Indiana, and that it was that way all the time, I have seen differently,
and I am really fighting for love of my country and flag.
I have seen the
elephant at Perryville, Ky., Stone River, Chickamauga, Mission Ridge, and
Lookout Mountain. Today I paid my
brother-in-law, Luke Short, $14.00 for 14 crackers that he had saved, and I
have stuck it out, and I am going to stick it out as long as this war lasts!
When my three years
are up, and I stay at home awhile, if I can keep my health, if the war is not
then over, I will enlist again, that is, if God spares me, long enough to see
my three years through!
Father used to tell
me when I was home and would not eat the crust of biscuit that I would see the
time when I would like to get it. At
the time I did not believe it. But now,
I think of that very often when we get nothing for three days at a time.
Our pickets and the
Rebels are so close on Chattanooga Creek that I could throw a stone and hit
them, but we do not dare talk. Sometimes our pickets sit on a log across the
creek and play cards like two brothers.
Our regiment, the
"Forty-Second Ind." is on picket every day; but today I was not
out. I had no shoes. I stood picket one night barefooted, and
refused to do so again. They put me in
guard house, with no one to guard me.
So I picked up four old mules and moved the Quarter-master James
Vickery, over the River.
Later I drove the four mules, hauling logs with them to build a fort, on
the spot where the Post Office now stands in Chattanooga. The poor mules
starved to death in four days. I must
quit writing now, I remain your brother until death.
GEORGE M.
KIRKPATRICK,
42nd Ind. Vet.
Vol. Inf.
1st Brigade lst. Div. 14 A.C.
* * * * *
Chattanooga, Tenn.
December 20th 1863
DEAR SISTER:
It is with exquisite
pleasure that I take my pen in hand to inform you that I am in good health and
in hopes that these few lines find you the same. The Company is all well too, and the weather is good now, only
rather cold. We have been at work
nearly every day.
Today is Sunday, and
it is a day of rest so I will
write to you. I just wrote to Dad...........The Captain has re-enlisted and is trying to get us all in; also
Colonel Wilder of the "Seventeen" is here trying to get all of the
Indiana regiments in, and I think that they will get the biggest part our
regiment in.
I think about coming
home, what it would mean, I could make two dollars where here I cant make 50c a
day-if God spares me!
Please send me some
stamps.
I remain your
brother, until death.
GEORGE M.
KIRKPATRICK.
* * * * *
Big Shanty,
June 29, 1864
DEAR SISTER:
These few lines will
let you know that we are down in "Rebeldom" I got to the regiment
today for the first time in two months.
I think that if you were here just for a little while you would wish
this infernal war was over!
To hear the shells
coming whizzing over, and the little balls come pecking around you cannot
imagine how they do sing! In this cruel
war every man has to run his chance.
I suppose you know
Thomas Trimble got killed in the skirmish the other day, and his brother,
Captain Trimple (sp?) came up with me, and never knew it until he got to the
company. He took it very hard.
I expect we will have
hard fight before we get through, but I can stand it, for I have done it before. There is no more news, so I will close. I remain your brother, until death.
I want all the people
to know we are fighting for our country.
Not one of the Kirkpatricks has ever flinched from duty.
UNDER THIS JACKET
THERE BEATS A GOOD HEART, AND AS LONG AS THE FLAG WAVES OVER MY HEAD, I WILL
FIGHT FOR IT, UNTIL I AM DEAD. So help
me God!
GEORGE M.
KIRKPATRICK.
* * * * *
Near
Atlanta, Ga.
July 29, 1864
DEAR SISTER:
I now sit down in the
presence of the enemy to write you, answering your letter of the 20th...........We are fighting all the time.
I can't write often, besides I had no paper. I can’t tell you everything that has taken place. We have been fighting ever since I last
wrote. I have not been out of hearing
of the whistle of a bullet or the roar of a cannon since then.
We left Peach Tree
battle ground, six miles from here on the 22nd of July and came through the
Rebel breastworks that 6000 niggers built for the protection of Atlanta.
our brigade was in
front of Thomas corp. 14, 1st brigade, 1st division. We stopped to rest for a few minutes. Thomas and all his staff were standing there talking. "Leather Britches," a German
officer who had gotten leave of six months from the Kaiser to raise a battery
to fight for this country at Pittsburg, was sitting on his horse near General
Thomas. In my hearing he said that this
place looked like the battle-field of Bull Run, and he would not be surprised
if it would not be another Bull Run.
A courier rode up and
handed General Thomas an order that told him that Atlanta was evacuated! Orders were that he should march his troops
immediately into the city.
General Thomas turned
to "Leather Britches" to have his bugler blow "Forward!"
The bugler, a French ex-soldier with one leg off at the thigh, turned on his
saddle, and blew, "Boots and saddle
forward!" with a
French bugle.
The battery had come
up to the front to be ready and the "Forty-Second Ind." started after
Thomas. We had not gone 100 yards when
some Rebels in a two story brick house fired a volley, and the General never
got off, but seemed to fall off his horse.
Our bugler bugled for
our regiment to deploy as a skirmish line and the fight was on. At the same moment McPherson's Corp was
ambushed by all the Rebel forces, after going through the same thing we did,
ten miles from our 14th Corp.
It proved later that
there were not as many Rebels in our front.
There were mostly citizens of Atlanta, as we captured 600, but not one
soldier. We could distinctly hear the
roar of the battle of Atlanta where McPherson was killed.
Now the Rebels were
massed on both sides of the road, and when McPherson's Corps, marching into
Atlanta as they thought, there was a desperate battle. Our men buried 400 Rebels, and 200 Union
soldiers, and we captured 1,500 Rebels
Yesterday the left
flank moved to the right, and had a big fight and captured 700 prisoners from
them. I can’t tell you how long we will
stay here. They have it in the papers
that we have Atlanta, but it is a great mistake.
Now at the present
moment I am sitting on the bank of the breastwork with a piece of cracker-box
for a desk, and the cannon and skirmish line and an orderly beside me making
fun of my writing etc.
Since I have been up
to the regiment at Bog Shanty, I have shot 2000 bullets out of my Springfield
rifle. We are two miles from Atlanta
and shelling the city with hot shot.
You must not believe what the papers say.
I am yours truly,
"until death."
GEORGE M.
KIRKPATRICK, Private.
Co. A., 42nd Regt. Ind.
Vet.
Vol. Inf.
1st Brig. 1st. Div. 14th A. C. Dept of the Cumberland
* * * * *
"The U. S.
Christian Commission."
General Hospital, No. 8, ward 6
Nashville, Tennessee.
DEAR SISTER:
You already know that
it was on the 11th of this month that I was wounded. My wound is getting along all right. You would not know me now, as I have gotten
down very poor, being that the wound was a very bad one. It went through the left breast. It was hunting for my heart, but could not
find it.
I am getting plenty
of food, and can eat like a horse. I
have not walked around any yet for the wound is so near my heart, and it pains
me. I just had it dressed and it pains
badly.
Do not look for me
home soon. Write soon,
Yours truly,
GEORGE M.
KIRKPATRICK.
* * * * *
Sent as a soldier's
messenger to his home. Let it hasten to
those who wait for tidings.
"For God so
loved the world that he gave His only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in
Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”
General Field
Hospital, No. 6. Sept. 8, 1864
New Albany, Indiana.
DEAR SISTER:
It is with pleasure
that I take my pen in hand to inform you of my present
situation. I am here living as well as
though I were at home. After staying in
Nashville ten days, I was transferred to Louisville, on a hospital train, was
there two days, and got a transfer to New Albany, Indiana.
My wound is getting
along all right. I have had almost no
treatment for five days...........I feel nearer home here in my own
State. Do not look for me home soon,
but may look for me at Evansville, as I have a transfer there to the
hospital. I wish you would come down to
Evansville in a week or so to see me.
I wont be able to go
home on a furlough. My wound is near
the heart, and has not begun to heal yet, and I have to stay where I can have
it tended to. I wont be able to leave
for a good while yet. A rib was broken,
and some bones worked out of the wound.
A good old German doctor attends me, and I get enough to eat.
I remain your brother
until death.
GEORGE M.
KIRKPATRICK.
* * * * *
O, blood red clouds,
cramping the sinking sun,
Drinking his waning
life away, Burn on.
And then a grave,
swallowing one by one,
Rob on, rob on, till all that is begun,
And the pale universe
into the Gulf sinks down!
* * * * *
Evansville, Ind.
December 4, 1864
Hospital No. 1 ward 2
DEAR SISTER:
I am now well and am
going to the front in a few days. I
have been working in the kitchen for the last week, and I get plenty to eat,
but it is hard work.
I want to go out to
Nashville and help fight again. I may
get wounded again, but I want to go just the same. The hospital is full and I am needed here to help with the cooking.
My wound is nicely
healed but I have not gained in flesh.
I remain your brother until death.
GEORGE M.
KIRKPATRICK.
* * * * *
Indianapolis, Ind.
May 23, 1865
Miss Martha
Kirkpatrick
DEAR SISTER:
………..We are leaving
tomorrow…….you may answer this as my mail will follow me. I am to give up my present position, and go
to Columbus, Ohio.
We will leave for good this time, and I am glad bad place for the regiment- it is so hot. Maybe we won’t go to any better place, for we will have to guard Rebs.
I turned in my gun over
to have it hauled there, as my arm is
so I cannot pack it yet……
Please give my
respects to all, your brother,
GEORGE M.
KIRKPATRICK.
* * * * *
Miscellany, Poems, et altera.
"CHICKAMAUGA."
I was a hoosier
farmer boy,
Who ran away from his
employ,
And enlisted, like so
many more
To paint my bayonet
with gore.
For I had caught that
kind of itch
That often comes to
boys, and which
There's nothing in
the world can cure
Like Army life-so
quick and sure.
What the others did I
must try too.
I had my eye teeth
cut clean through
Before I saw my home
again
Or got half through
my first campaign.
I thought it must be
mighty fine
To march, all
uniformed in line;
Behind a noisy drum
and fife
That thrills all
youthful souls with life;
To have the girls in
rapture gaze
And clap their lovely
hands in praise,
As we went marching
down the street,
With jaunty air and
haughty feet,
A musket on right
shoulder laid, In grand review, on dress parade.
It fairly made me
burst with pride
To think what swathes
we'd cut-how wide!
And then 'twould be
such lots of fun
To make those Johnny
Gray-backs run;
Go marching through
their captured towns
And see them
trembling at our frowns.
For who could stand
one moment where,
We'ed fling our
banners to the air?
But-making Johnny
Graybacks run
Didn't prove to be
such lots of fun.
And taking Rebel
forts and towns
Took more than angry
looks and frowns-
As we found out in
proper form
The first day's
outing in the storm.
* * * * *
The company of crowds
may dull the edge of memory's blade,
And keep our thoughts
from wandering unto mistakes we've made;
But when the dim
lights, burning low find us all alone,
Tis then we reap the
harvest of the worthless seed we've sown.
'Tis often thus in
solitude, I leave the beaten track,
And on the wings of
memory to happier days since gone;
I see my youthfull
friends, and home, and faces long since gone;
I hear the songs we
used to sing; they haunt me when
alone.
I feel again the
hopefulness, of life when just begun.
Alas! the hopes have
faded like the dew before the sun;
And looking down the
road of life that once I thought so fair,
I see the shattered
columns of my castles in the air.
I hear my mother's
lullaby, I see her tender face;
I see her sitting by
the hearth in the old familiar place;
And from the
fountains of my heart the silent tears will flow;
I live again in
memory, the days of long ago.
I seem to hear the
music of some long forgotten ball;
The strains upon my
memory, with mystic rhythm fall;
the misty distance I
see, or think I see
A face that in the
old, old days was very dear to me.
The fairy,
white-robed vision floats before my tear-dimmed sight,
Then fades away to
nothingness within the deeps of night;
But throbbing in my
saddened heart I feel the same old pain
As when we parted
silently to never meet again.
And so they come and
so they go, these visions of the past-
Those silent, sad
reminders of days too sweet to last;
But let them come,
these fantasies of hopes and joys long gone.
For though they're
sad, they all are sweet to me, when all alone.
* * * * *
Back to the old home,
viewing scenes of childhood,
There's where I knew
no care nor pain;
There in my childish
glee, under a woodland tree,
Oh, how I long to go
to the old home once again !
When in my dreaming,
visions rise before me,
They seem to take me
back once more-
Back to the spot so
dear, with my mother standing near
Yes, I can see her as
in the days of yore.
Chorus
Back to the old home,
take me;
There in my childhood
I roamed;
Back to the scenes of
those joyous days,
Back to the dear old
home.
Tho' I'm old now,
still I love to linger on happy tho'ts of bygone day;
When thro' the woods
I wandered far from the dear old home,
Gathering the scented
flowers that grew along the way
Now I'm alone, no
loving hearts to soothe me-those that I
loved have gone
before.
But while my loved
ones wait, there at the golden gate,
Take, oh take me back
to the dear old home once more!
* * * * *
George M. Kirkpatrick
was born in German Township, on a farm, January 5, 1846-the youngest of fifteen
children.
He enlisted in
Co. "A” Forty-Second Ind. Vol.
Inf. in July 1861. Six brothers, four brothers-in-law, three nephews and
twenty-seven cousins were in the Civil War on the side of the Union, while six
cousins were in the Rebel army.
His father arrived in
Evansville in 1812, when Hugh Mcgarry lived in a house built on poles, on Main
Street at about 7th or 8th street. It
was the only house then built there.
........His father had
seventy-six grandchildren in 1862. He
and his wife were married five miles from Fort Branch, on a farm, in 1820. His father was on the grand jury for about
forty years after Vanderburg County was founded, or taken from Gibson or Posey.
This record, dated
Sept. 25, 1924, Evansville, Ind. states that Mr. Kirkpatrick had been living in
Chicago about fifty years at the time, and had visited, every year the reunion,
of Co. A, of whom the following were then living: George G. Bernard, Shuttler,
John Albacker, and Joseph Phar of Princeton, out of one-hundred eighty three
men who enlisted, and who were drilled by Captain Ohlmsted, and Col. Chas.
Denby at the Old Fair Ground, with flint-lock muskets, four others were,
Captain Atchison, Trimble, Messick, McCutcheon.
* * * * *
PERRYVILLE, October
8, 1862
STONE RIVER, December
31, 1862, and Jan. 1, 1863
CHICKAMAUGA,
September 21st to 23rd, 1863
LOOK OUT MOUNTAIN,
November 23, 1863.
MISSIONARY RIDGE,
November 24, 1863.
RESSACA, May 14, 1864
DALTON, May 24, 1864
KENESAW, June 3, 1864
PEACH TREE CREEK,
June 24, 1864
ATLANTA, August 11,
1864
* * * * *
"42nd Regiment
Indiana Veteran Volunteer Infantry.
1st Brigade, lst
Division, 14th Army of the Cumberland.”
The
"Forty-Second" was enlisted at Evansville, Ind., Oct. 8th, 1861, at
the old Fair ground, marched to Henderson, Ky.; to Calhoun; to Owensburg on
the Ohio River; embarked on steamboat, down the river and up the Cumberland
river to the relief of Fort Donelson; then to Nashville, Feb. 25, 1862; then to
Murfreesboro; Shelbyville; Fayettesville and Huntsville, Ala.; Whitesburg
Landing, and from thence crossed the Tennessee River going twenty-five miles
through the country, burning cotton gins; back to Huntsville; to Decard
station; to Shelbyville; Murfreesboro; Nashville, Bowling Green, Ky.; and
Louisville, Ky. Sept. 25, 1862.
Leaving Louisville,
for the battle of Chaplin Hills at Perryville, Ky., where our loss was 166
officers and men killed, wounded and missing.
From there we marched to Crab Orchard, Ky.; then to Lebanon, Glasco,
Bowling Green, and to Nashville; thence to Stone River battle, Jan. 1, 1863.
We lost 150 officers
and men, killed, wounded and missing.
We left Murfreesboro, June 25, 1863.
Thence to Hillsboro, Winchester and Dechard Station, Tenn., July 4,
'63. Thence to Hillsboro, Winchester
and Dechard Station, Tenn., July 4, '63; from there to Stevenson and Brigeport,
Ala., crossed Lookout Mountain, Dug Gap, Pigeon Mountain, Georgia; then down to
Chickamauga Battle, where we lost 107 officers and men.
After this we went to
Chattanooga, and re-enlisted January 4, '64, for three years more. This is called "veteranizing." In
order to re-enlist for three years more, having seven months more to serve, we,
as a regiment, had to vote, and it required three quarters to do so. Now as an
incentive to enlist we were ordered as Guard for the Eighth Indiana Battery
heavy artillery, to the relief of Knoxville Tennessee.
As it had been
raining for five or six days, the roads were bad. We had to chose between going up there and re-enlisting for three
years more or during the war, receiving four-hundred bounty, all back pay and
three months pay in advance.
After voting on it
night and day for forty-eight hours, we could not receive enough men, by two
votes.
We had to form in
line every two hours and it pouring down min.
At two o'clock at night, we became desperate, and we got one man, who
had been badly diseased, and was not fit for service, to get in line; also one
man with two fingers off his right hand, who would not pass either, we made
them get into the line.
One of us went behind
him and put our good right hand under his arm, and held it out so that the
doctor could see our two hands (?), eyes and teeth, by the light of a lantern
with a tallow candle burning in it-and THAT IS WHAT WE DID TO GET TO REENLIST.
Now, incidentally, New York City had agents there, who offered us $800 cash to be quoted to their city to fill their call for new recruits. But not US! We voted to a man, to be quoted at home, where our fathers, brothers and friends were being drafted in the service. We were promised money from our state, county and town to help fill the state call. However we did not get a cent, but we did prevent some of them from being drafted. Every seventh man had to go.
When we returned to
Nashville, we could not get cars to ride in, so we had to march back to
Chattanooga a hundred and seventy-five miles.
We started on the
Atlanta campaign in May and were over three months in fighting. A hundred
thirty-seven miles to Atlanta. For
three months there was not one hour, we could not hear a bullet whistle around
us, which is not pleasant to say the least
I was only 15 years
old when I joined the army and nineteen
years old when I returned, having fought in 25 battles and 100 skirmishes;
marched and, was transported 6000 miles, was wounded five times, received
$11.00 per month, and later $16.00. I never held an office and am proud of it!
In my company was a
little drummer boy, 10 years of age, who served out his three years. His father had been a lieutenant.
Each company had 100
men in it. Ours did also, when we first
went to the front, but when we got out, there were only TWELVE of the original
one hundred left.
We used to figure out that it required 3000 bullets to every man who was killed, and considering how many bullets each soldier had shot at him, there seemed only a slim chance to escape from them. But even so, notwithstanding, sickness was our worst enemy. To every one who died of wounds seven died of sickness, so you do not have any choice as a soldier, but sometimes would even welcome death, in preference to marching and exposure to the weather and other hardships.
When at home, people would ask us where we went when it rained and how the rebels looked. Those seemed like foolish questions. For about two years we had no tents. Each man had a piece four feet square with buttons on one side and button holes on the other side. Two men would put theirs together, and put up two little forked sticks, two feet high, and put a stick across, and the two pieces buttoned together. Would form what we called a pup tent, and which the officers called a shelter tent. My partner and I were six feet two and one half inches tall, and when we got in bed, two feet two and a half inches had to sleep out of doors!
* * * * *
INDIANA CHICKAMAUGA
COMMISSION
Oakland
City, Ind.,
July 24,
1913
Mr. George M.
Kirkpatrick:
"The U. S.
Christian Commission."
MY DEAR COMRADE:
I remember you well
and I was glad to hear from you. You
were a member of a good company, and one that was always ready to do its
part...... I think that Captain Ohlmstead, if he had lived would have made a fine
field officer, and maybe have attained the rank of a general.
I am glad to see you
at the head of a Grand Army Post.
I don’t know what to
say about a Reunion of our old regiment, on the 20th of September, at our
monument in the Great Chickamauga Park.
I am a member of the
Indiana Park Commission, and I would be glad to meet with old members of our
regiment, and if I thought that we could gather any of the members of the
regiment together, I would be glad to make such a request through the papers,
in about
these words:
'THE FORTY-SECOND
INDIANA REGIMENT REUNION IN THE CHICKAMAUGA PARK.”
There will be a
reunion of the members of the Forty-Second Indiana Volunteer Infantry held in
the Chickamauga Park September 20, 1913.
Fifty years from the date set for this reunion, our regiment was in the
very hell of battle on that ground. COMRADES,
this will likely be the last opportunity we will have of visiting the scenes of
that terrible battle.
WILLIAM COCKRUM,
Lt. Col. 42nd Ind.
Vols.
* * * * *
Grand Island, Nebraska
February 8, 1913(4?)
George M.
Kirkpatrick,
DEAR COMRADE:
The photos are
fine……I remember that on that Sunday morning-September 20, 1863, 1 felt very
little honor for any of the men. Why
they ran away without any orders, and in such a hurry, and I asked myself where
were our officers, great and small?
I know two soldiers
who were not scared to death. I was
just as cool lying there between two fires as I am now, and you were the only
one out of one hundred that had bravery enough in, the face of death and the
hail of bullets to stop and try to get wounded comrade out of that hell of a
place! You could not help me. I told you to run and save yourself or we
would both be killed, that I was done for any how. You were shot through both arms, and the blood running from the wounds in your arms struck me
in the face, and I never knew where the blood came from until fifty years
after, when we met at the spot again.
You left me in the
hands of the Rebs and by saving yourself, you were able to fight many days
afterwards (not behind a pile of knapsacks) I sometimes wonder if maybe it
would not have been as well if you had not written me and met me at the battle
field, Sept. 20, 1913.
For fifty years I did
not know whether you were alive or not (after you ran through that old fence
row of briars and bushes on the jump), but since we have begun writing and
since the trip to Chattanooga in 1913, you are hardly out of my mind when
awake. Write often for we must keep in
close touch during the rest of our short lives.
If those fellows
behind the knapsacks had had the gritt you had, they might be alive today. I saw Tom Denison and many others run by me
in the hands of the Rebs, and Tom.....died in Andersonville...….
R. P. McCutcheon
Late Co. A 42nd Ind. Vet. Vol. Inf.
1st Brigade, 1st
division.
Army of the
Cumberland.
* * * * *
I will go back to
Evansville, Indiana when George Kirkpatrick and myself with many others,
enlisted in Co. “A,” 42nd Indiana Infantry, for three years or
during the war. We were with the
regiment in all its battles, skirmishes, etc. Our command belonged to the Army
of the Cumberland.
On the 19th of
September, 1863, we met the enemy under General Bragg at Chickamauga. At that time we were in the 14th Corps, with
Gen, George H. Thomas, Commander.
We supported our
battery all day Saturday. Seven horses
were killed within fifty yards of us, and how many men, I cannot say. We rested all night on our arms, and at
day-light, we marched to the extreme right, where we met Longstreet’s men.
We sent our
skirmishers along the Lafayette Road.
They were soon driven in. The
fight was now on in earnest. After
firing into the enemy, many shots, our army fell back. I saw them coming about two-hundred yards
away, and I thought I would give them one more shot.
Just at that moment,
a musket ball hit me in the left hip, crashed through the bone, and there it
stopped, and it is there to this day.
I fell down and
George Kirkpatrick ran to me to get me out of that terrible hail of
bullets. He knelt down to cut the
cartridge box off from me, when a bullet passed through both of his arms,
cutting the front of his shirt off.
I then told him to
run and save his life, that he would be killed if he remained, and that I was
done for anyway.
(He left me and
served to the end of the war, and was wounded five times.)
In fifteen minutes
the enemy were passing over me. They
were very kind to me, the officer-- giving me water from their canteens. In the afternoon, the enemy lifted me into
their ambulance, and took me to their Field hospital, where there were six
hundred and thirty wounded. They very
tenderly laid me on the ground. I was
the only Yankee there, and I was a show for the country people. They came for miles to see a live
Yankee. I lay there for two months,
then was put on the cars and taken to Atlanta, Georgia.
I was put into a
military prison, with four or five hundred wounded Federals, and remained there
three months, all the time on my back.
I was exchanged
February 20, 1864 At Rossville, Georgia.
There were thirty of us, all badly crippled. We were hungry and nearly naked.
WHEN WE SAW THE
UNITED STATES FLAG FOR THE FIRST TIME IN FIVE OR SIX MONTHS, THERE WAS A SHOUT
WENT UP, OF JOY THAT WE HAD AT LAST GOT TO GOD'S COUNTRY AGAIN. Some of them prayed, some swore and others
cried-for we were now safe.
I was sent home on
crutches and have been a cripple ever since.
Fifty years after the
battle, I got a letter from the Comrade. (I thought he was dead all the time)
asking me to meet him at Chickamauga on September 20th. 1913.
We met, went to the
battlefield, found the place where we were both wounded fifty years
before. We placed ourselves on the
ground in the same position and place we were in, on that terrible morning of
Septmeber 20, 1863.
The foregoing is an
account of our experience in battle, and duties of a private soldier, but the
half can never be told.
WE SIMPLY DID OUR
DUTY AS AMERICAN CITIZENS.
R. P. McCUTCHEON,
"Co.
A, 42nd Reg." Indiana Infantry.
* * * * *
G. A. R.
It was said of the
old soldier, that going down into the river of death, he came up on the other
side, and that all the hosts came out with banners and trumpets to meet him,
and not until we scarred vets receive our final welcome into the City
Beautiful, will we know the pathos of our years on the land.
Gone are our youth
and beauty; after four years in the army
Many of us come forth, shot through and through, invalided, or broken forever. For sixty years our life has been one long Gethsemane, one bleak via delores, when every day the Angels of success, offered a cup of bitterness, over-flowing.
Now our long
martyrdom is nearly over; some of us say we are old and broken; but how can a
soldier be old, who has brought liberty, eternally young and beautiful, into
being?
How can a veteran be
poor who has achieved eternal riches for all the people of the South?
How can an old
soldier be obscure when he is lifted up and made glorious in the presence of
the assembled millions, of his native land?
Already for a
multitude, the signal is hung out from the battlements of Heaven. Here shall we fold our tents, and steal away
after all the thunders of battle have died away in distance. Life’s battles are
fought, and we shall encamp in the Promised Land and hang out our signal of
everlasting victory.
Going in, we shall
not be unwanted, not unknown, for will not our comrades-in-arms stand expecting
and awaiting us? Will not the patriots
and heroes and the martyrs who bled at Marathon, and more who bled at Valley
Forge, or struggled at Gettysburg stand waiting to receive us?
We have a right to
come in, and to be greeted by Grant and Lee and all the heroes who died that
the Union might live; and be the great emancipator, the martyred President, and
when the last roll is called and the last page in this chapter of Liberty is
written, it shall be said.
"I saw an old
soldier come up out of the valley of the shadow of death, and all the heroes
come forth to meet him and greet him, and with banners and trumpets, they
brought him HOME."
GEORGE M. KIRKPATRICK
National Soldiers
Home,
Virginia.
* * * * *
I do not think the
heaven to which we go
Will be so strange
that we shall feel afraid,
But, rather, that the
sweetest things we know
Will flourish
undecayed.
I
do not think the songs will all be new,
Or we should hunger
for the sweet old lays,
Whose echoes oft have
bid our souls be true,
Amid the loftier
praise.
To think the choirs
will hush their anthem when
The fear for earth
the homesick pang;
And we shall sing to
listening angels, then
The songs our mothers
sang!
-Christian Work-
* * * * *
EDITORIAL
NOTE
Mr. Kirkpatrick,
years ago, engaged his comrade, Reverend Joshia L. Albritton, who preached the
funeral sermon of James A. Garfield, to officiate at his funeral. Asked what text he wished used, he specified
the seventh verse of the fourth chapter of second Timothy.
"I have fought a
good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith."
THE END