Excerpt from Civil War Letters, 1861 to 1865 Letter I. Camp Randall, Madison, Wis., January 19, 1862. Dear Mother: - We arrived here twelve o'clock Friday night, went to a hotel and got something to eat and stopped there until morning, when we went to the Capitol and were mustered into the United States service, and drew our uniforms, and now we are full fledged volunteer soldiers of Uncle Sam, and most of the Boys think now that they could whip the whole Southern Army, if they only had a chance. I saw Guy Myers here; his regiment has gone to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas; he was sick in the hospital and was left behind. Guy was a little surprised to see Sam and me. Sam and myself are both well, and feel as big as the rest of the boys in our new uniforms. I guess I will close this time, so will say Good Bye. Say, mother, as this is my first letter as a Soldier Boy put it away and keep it until I come home. Direct your letters to Camp Randall, Madison, Wisconsin, care of Captain McGowen. I do not know the letter of our Company yet; we will be in the 17th Regiment. Well Good Bye. Write soon. Affectionately, your boy, Letter II. Pittsburg Landing, Tenn., April 3, 1862. Dear Mother: - Our regiment left St. Louis March 26 on the steamer Imperial and went down the Mississippi to Cairo, Illinois, then up the Ohio to the Tennessee, and from there up the river to what they call here Pittsburg Landing. Cannot see much of a landing, only one log house. However we are back from the Landing about three miles and fixing our camp. There are four other regiments in our brigade, the 16th Wisconsin, 4th Kentucky and the 20th Missouri, besides ours. General McArthur commands the brigade and General Grant commands the whole army. Say, mother, it begins to look more like business than it did while, we were in camp up North and sometimes I wish I was up North now instead of here, but here I am and here I will stay, I suppose. Say, mother, I don't like old Captain McGowen at all; he is a cross old bear. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.