“Dear Papa, Mother and brothers, Saturday we went out for a foraging. We took 60 teams with us and ladened them all off one man’s farm with corn and hay and corn blades. We live pretty well now. We have had it pretty bad. When we go out a foraging I have seen them take the meat and pone out of the pot right before the woman of the house,” writes John Boyd, Nov. 27, 1862
In a letter written on Christmas morning, 1862, we learn that son James Boyd has also joined the Civil War, drafted into service, after two of his brothers had voluntarily become Union soldiers.
James assures his family near Jeromesville, Ohio, that he is in “perfect health and in good spirits.” Anchored 30 miles north of Vicksburg on the Louisiana shore, James tells of the routine aboard ship. “Yesterday, when we were on a bend in the river, I could see boats of the fleet both ways as far as my eyes could see. Lots of houses are burned down, the chimneys are standing. The plantations are very heavy timbered. There are lots of cotton fields that aint pulled yet. It looks nice. Night before last I stood picket in a cornfield.”
James closes the one and only letter he would ever write home with an ominous tone: “I am happy, but remember this Christmas never comes again so do not forget you must soon die. Nothing more. Farewell, for this time, but not forever. James Boyd to his kind parents and brothers.
March 19, 1863, is the date on a letter from John Boyd. “I was sorry to hear that James was dead, but I hope that he has gone to rest. Then he is better off than any of us, but I hope we will meet him in heaven.”
Imagine the heartache of this family as they grieved the loss of James. A monument in the Jeromesville Cemetery reads, “James Boyd, 42nd Reg., O.V.I. died at Vicksburg, aged 21 years, 5 months, 18 days.”
Consider their worry when the return address in this March letter from eldest, John, is “Marine Hospital, Ward No. 2, Cincinnati, Ohio.”
“I am well, all but my leg and it is getting better. It is almost healed up but I can only touch my toe to the floor. I don’t think I will ever get it straight.” He adds, “Well, Mother, don’t take it so hard about James. I saw a poor boy die on the boat as we came here. When you write again, I want you to let me know whether you sent for his body or not and whether he volunteered after he was drafted or not. I never got a letter from him after he left Mansfield.”
In a long and considerate letter to his mother dated March 24, 1863, Stephen assures his mother of his good health and conveys his appreciation for letters from home. Stephen’s ornery side shows as he writes, “The peach trees are all out in bloom nice in Clarksville, Tennessee “and there is a very good prospect for plenty of fruit. I hope that they will leave us here till we can help them to eat their fruit.”
“They can’t carry on farming very strong this summer for their slaves are scarce having run off from their masters to the Union army. They don’t care much about leaving now for since the war broke out, they say their masters have used them very well.”
Stephen again writes home from Fort Bruce on April 28, “All hope that is left the traitors in the south that Vallandingham will be elected and then there will be a division in the North and then they will get what they are risking their necks for, and that is the destruction of this glorious Union. I just wish this war would cease — first, so that we could all get home, and then I’ll bet Copperheads now would be scarcer than hen teeth. I am of the opinion that it won’t last long, but no one knows, but famine must soon ensue if it is carried on much longer.”
Next week: Stephen writes of hopes for his life post-war.
