150-year-old Civil War Letter Warns Against the Clap!

Civil War Love Letters Written 150 years ago

As we continue to commemorate the 150-year anniversary war, here is another excerpt from my book Ever True: A Union Private and His Wife, published by Heritage Books. The following battles were fought by private Charles McDowell in September 1864:

 

September 19 Battle of Winchester
September 22 Fisher's Hill

Leading up to those battles are a few of the love letters between Charles and his teenage wife Nancy--my great-great grandparents from upstate New York. Nancy not only had to worry about Charles dying in battle, she also worried about "the clap!"

To Nancy from Charles:

 

[Tenallytown]                                                       Sept the 4-1864

Dearest Wife,

            We are at Tennallytown yet.  We are having splendid nice weather her[e] now.

            There is quite an excitement here about re-enlisting.  I bet you two thirds of the army will enlist.  Grant's army is rather getting the start of the rebs now but they ain’t whipped yet.  They are tough fellows.  I soon found that out when we went to the front.      

            You wouldn’t hardly know me now.  I hadn’t shaved since we started for the front till today and my mustache got so long I couldn’t eat molasses very well and I cut it off and most all the rest of my whiskers.  The boys don’t hardly know me. 

            John Perkins is a prisoner.  Fred Stell is killed.  We can’t hear much about the prisoners. 

            From your ever true and affectionate husband, C McDowell

 

To Charles from Nancy:                                                                                                                                             

Dearest Husband,                                            September 4 1864

             I have just got the letter that you wrote the fourth of July.   I don’t think purty much of that girl being so clever.   High Thompson, he found some clever ones out there.   The folks says that he has got the clap [gonorrhea] so that they can’t go in the house because he smells so bad, and they don’t think that he will live long.   They thought he was dead one day.    The doctor had been fixing him.  

             The cannons roared all night last night.   They don’t know what it was for but they think is some good news.   They say that we have taking Mobile and they think that Petersburg will be ourn in a week’s time.   I hope it is all true but I am afraid it is almost too good to be true.   They say that Old Abe says the war will end in three months. 

            You say that you go and see Miss Feaks purty often.   I wish I was there so I could go with you.  I hope that you can stay to Tennallytown till your time is out.   It seams almost like an age.  A whole year before you can come home but I am glad every time when night comes.   I think one more day has past and gone and your time is so much nearer out but it will pass off after a while. It can’t last always.

            Hank Jule is drafted.  I don’t know whether he will go or not.   They have filled up Huron’s call. They give them fifteen hundred apiece, but Sodus, they will hafto come to a draft for there has so many run too.

            The paper states that they are paying all the armies off now but I though[t] your being to Tennallytown your wouldn’t get your pay.   I would like to know if your have heard anything from Cary or not.   She hasn’t heard from him since he was…

            From your ever true and affectionate wife Nancy McDowell

 

To Charles from Nancy:

                                                                               

Dearest Husband,                                       September the 11 1864

            You spoke about the regiment enlisting again.   I hope that you won’t be so foolish to enlist again.   I had drather go with half enough to eat than have you enlist again. The big bounty I would[n’t] look at it.   I had drather have my freedom than all the money.  

            The men get from two dollars to twenty sh_______ pr day and thirty dollars pr month.  Any body can earn a living, and if you get hurt, I can work ____ get us a living.  I would work night and bet  you should have enough to eat.  I wouldn’t have you enlist again for two thousands dollars if I could have my way about it.  You said that your captain resigned and had gone home.   Who is your captain now?

             I sent you some camphor gum I would like to know if you got it.   I would like to have your likeness since you shaved.   I think I would know it.

            Am here all alone today.   All the rest has gone to meeting.   I wish you was here with me.   This makes me think of my dream last night.   I thought I was out there with you and we was up to Miss Feaks and we had a good visit and we was carrying on like everything and I laugh so loud that it woke me up.   I have thought about it all [?] morning

            Dave wrote home to know what Pa and Ma thought about his enlisting.  I think he is foolish.   He said he wouldn’t enlist for all of Verginey.   I think he turns his tune but [?] him enlist.   Don’t you?  

            I don’t suppose that [you] hafto stand guard nights now.

            From your ever true affectionate wife

 

To Nancy from Charles:

 

[Probably Tennallytown]                                   Sept the 12 - 1864

Dearest Wife

            We have had a considerable of rain lately and it is pretty cool weather here now.  They say Hammond and his wife had a quarrel and he has enlisted.

            I got the letter that had the dollar in I guess I won’t send it back for I have got it most all spent for apple dumplings and milk.  There is peddlers here all the while with them and you know how I like dumplings. I wish you was here now to make another such a batch as we had last winter.  I think I could manage some of them.  They are ten cts apiece.  Mrs. Hoxie has 25 cts apiece for pies now, 75 cts a meal.

            That fellow that [you] spoke about [the one with the “clap”] is pretty bad off.  You talk as though you thought I might get in that way. But Nat you needn’t be uneasy about that and I don't think I am quite as soft in the head as to go in such speculations as that and I don't think that you would think that I would do any such a thing.  Anyway if you do, you are greatly mistaken. 

            What does the folks think about election out there? Here the most of them thinks Old Abe will get it again and I think so and I think the war will be settled under him as quickly as any body else. The most the rebs is waiting now is election.  I think they will come to some settlement after election. They would like to have McClellan in if they could.

             I was to Mrs. Feaks today.  She is well.  I left a nice little there that I found. She wants me to give it to her but I don't know whether to give it to her or send it home.

             You said you was pretty lonesome.  I dare say you be Nat but you must keep up good courage. The time will soon run round when I can be at home again.  Sometimes I feel very lonesome, but when I think of the time and how fast it is passing, I get over it again. If I can get through the remainder of my time as well as I have the fore part I shall feel very thankful, although I have had some pretty close calls.

            I think I told you that at Monocacy a piece of shell or a ball broke my gun and Carpenter told me to throw it away and pick up another and I picked up a nice rifle. You could have picked up a gun there any place.  I was afraid I would get over heated that day for I was one of the last off of the field and I was awful warm when I came off, and then we had to take a double quick once and a while to keep out of their batteries, and I was most choked for a drink, but I doesn’t drink much.  I was so warm and another thing, we hadn't any too much time to get it.

            I ain’t doing much of anything but I get just as much pay as though I had worked hard.  I am afraid I have got in a bad place to learn how to work but I guess I can learn how when I get home again

            From your ever true and affectionate husband c. McDowell

            I hadn’t but just my letter finished when we had orders to move. We are in Washington now waiting for cars to take us to Harpers Ferry. We have got orders to fall in now.

 

 

Chapter Eleven

 

Sheridan’s Shenandoah Valley campaign

The Battles of Opequon (or Winchester), Fisher’s Hill and Cedar Creek

 

 

To Nancy from Charles:

 

(Near Berrysville - 22 miles from Harpers Ferry)       Sept the 18-64

Dearest Wife,

             We lay in front of the enemy but there is no fighting on either side, and I guess there won’t be any very quick without they attack us.  All we want is to keep them here at present. 

            We are encamped in the woods. It’s a nice place but we don’t know how long we will stay here.  We are about 22 miles from Harpers Ferry near Berryville.  That letter that had that dollar in ain’t here nor them papers.  I guess that is lost.  I got your letter dated the 11 when we was at Washington.  Carpenter is acting as captain now. 

            You say you was alone.  I know you was lonesome but you must keep up good courage.  I feel in hopes that I shall soon be with you.  Now you had quite a dream.  I would have been glad if it had been true.  You said you didn’t want me to enlist.  You needn’t be scart.  I don’t [I] think shall if you didn’t want me to.  I shouldn’t anyway for all the money they can stack up. 

            From your ever true and affectionate husband C. McDowell

The above was an excerpt from my book and play, Ever True: A Union and His Wife. If you would like to see or present a reading of their letters, contact me at saundersbooks@aol.com

 

 

 

 

Civil War Love Letters Written 150 years ago

As we continue to commemorate the 150-year anniversary war, I reread the letters between my great-great grandparents in my book Ever True, published by Heritage Books. Their following letters highlight the Battle of Cold Harbor in June of 1864 (the book also includes a letter from the doctor who amputated my long-ago cousin's arm amputation after the battle). At the battlefield site, a plaque says that the amputations caused blood to seep through the floorboards onto the family who owned the house turned hospital.

Charles:

June the 6th, 1864

Near Cold Harbor, VA

Dearest Wife

            We have been fighting for most four days.  We was relieved about three hours ago to come to the rear and rest a little, but we have been for three days where we doesn’t stand up a minute without having a dozen bullets sent at us.  The first night we came here, we charged on them and took eleven hundred prisoners.  Some of our boys was so excited when the Rebs jumped upon the parapet, with both hands held up to surrender, that they fired right in them.

            Seward shows himself a man, not a coward.  In the charge he went right in.  He took one rebel with his sword and knocked him head over heels. He got one leg of his pants tore most off.  He looked pretty rough.   

            When we was on the march coming down here, I used to feel sorry for some of the women.  They cried and went on awfully.  The boys would shoot their cattle and chickens and pigs, and everything else, and go right in the house and take anything they wanted.

            Vanderbelt was shot right through the under arm.  It’s pretty bad.  Hank Porter was just shot dead.  I help carry him out.

            I hope they will give us some chance to sleep some tonight.

From your ever true and affectionate husband.

 

Mrs. Janet Seward:  “On the evening of the 1st of June, while sitting in the twilight, I heard my Husband call ‘Jenny.’  I jumped up, listened, and heard again, ‘Jenny,’ so distinctly that I went into the hall, and again came the voice, ‘Jenny’ so plain I looked over the railing, fully expecting to see him coming up the stairs.  There was no one there, and I went back disappointed, thinking how strange it was.  Afterwards, I found that this occurrence took place at the very hour that he was in the Battle of Cold Harbor, and came very near losing his life.”

 

 

Charles:

June the 19th, 1864

Near Petersburg

Dearest Wife,

            I tell you a soldier’s life is a curious life.  Sometimes we are ordered to halt and put up our tents, and we just get them up, when we are ordered to pack up and leave.  I have seen some of the men drop right down in the middle of the road, they would be so tired.  Sometimes the dust flies so we can’t see a rod ahead of us.

            We was ordered to make a charge yesterday morning, but we got in front of their works and found them rather strong, so we had to fall back.  John Dean was shot through the head when going out of the pit to make some coffee.  He died instantly.  It was a rebel sharp shooter that done it. They are pretty good marksmen.

We had a flag of truce hoisted twice when we was there to have a chance to bury the dead.  We would go half way to meet the Rebs and change newspapers, and they talked very reasonable about the war.  They say if it wasn’t for the officers they would be all right.

 

Nancy:

Dearest Husband,

            I was very glad to hear from you.   Oh yes, I had almost give you up for dead.   It is all I ask for in the world, that your life may be spared so that you can return home.  I don’t think that anything would make me unhappy when I could have you so near me, and know that you wasn’t in such great danger. But the Lord knows best whether I shall ever see you again or not.

            My cousin Stephen Wager was in that battle [Cold Harbor] and got his right arm shot off. He had it amputated in the shoulder joint.  

            Miss Carry don’t hear anything from her man, as he can’t write. They have the story around that he is wounded.

            I bid you goodbye, hoping to hear from you again.  

           

Narrator:  Nancy continues to receive Charles’s letters describing his involvement in history-making battles, marches, and the destruction and theft of Confederate property.  

But Charles also writes of the mundane, the kind of information only a wife would be interested to know. Like the time he is living in Southern territory with two Confederate women.

 

Charles:

July the 4^th, 1864

Dearest Wife,

            I aint where I was last fourth, but we have got a nice place here for a day or two.

            There is two women lives here.  An old woman and a girl, and they cook for us and we fare pretty well.

            Before we guarded the house, other soldiers came before the women was up, and broke in, and took everything they had.  They was left without a thing to eat.  I don’t know what she would do if it wasn’t for us soldiers.  We give them hardtack and coffee.

            Goodbye Nancy.  I wish I was with you today.

            I will now write a few more lines to you.  The fourth is past.  I enjoyed myself very well.  That woman cooked me some more greens and they was good.  If it wasn’t for one thing, I would be most a tempted to strike up a bargain with the girl.  She is a real nice clever girl.

 

Nancy:  I have just got the letter that you wrote the Fourth of July.  I don’t think purty much of that girl being so clever.  High Thompson, he found some clever ones out there.  The folks says that he has got the clap so that they can’t go in the house because he smells so bad.  They don’t think that he will live long.  They thought he was dead one day.  The doctor had been fixing him.

...

My books is also a one-act play. Contact me at saundersbooks@aol.com if you would like to discuss presenting it.  

Civil War Fried Cakes (donuts)

I included the following recipe in my book, Ever True: A Union Private and His Wife, because my great-great grand parents spoke of them in their love letters to each other (other mentioned foods are also included in my book such as Johnnycakes, apple dumplings and Mrs. Seward's Pound Cake).

 

Fried Cakes (donuts)

 

My mother remembers her mother making fried cakes on their farm in Sodus, N.Y. For an extra treat she coated them with sugar.

 

5 tablespoons butter

1 cup sugar

2 beaten eggs

4 cups sifted flour

4 teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

1 cup milk

Cream together sugar and butter. Stir in beaten eggs. Sift flour, baking powder, and salt; add to sugar mixture alternately with milk. Chill thoroughly.

 

Roll out 1/3 inch thick on lightly floured surface. Cut with floured donut cutter (the hole is necessary in order for the dough to cook throughout).

Fry a few at a time in deep fat (turn deep electric frying pan to 375 degrees) until brown, turning once. Drain. Makes about 3 dozen.

 

To sugar donuts: When cool, place a few at a time in a paper bag with confectioners or granulated sugar and shake well. 

Mary Ann McDowell Avazian

Recipe: Civil War and Apple Pies

The following apple pie recipe is from the book, Ever True: A Union Private and His Wife

 (see televised "reader's theater")

by Lisa Saunders

                Nancy's time at Forte Foote was spent baking pies and selling them to the soldiers. Apparently she was a large supplier of these delicacies despite the effort to enforce protection "against free trade in pies” (Roe 51).

Civil War letter describing Nancy's apple pie business at Fort Foote along the Potomac River.  Excerpt from EVER TRUE (now a "reader's theater):

 

To Friends from Charles and Nancy:

 

[Fort Foote]                                               November the 6-1863

Dear Friends,

             I have neglected writing for some time but to tell you the truth, I haven’t got much time.  I am detailed to work on the barracks and nights, I heft to help Nancy peel apples.  Nancy is in the pie business pretty strong.  Since she has come here she has made up seven barrels of apples and most two barrels of flour.  She has a woman to help her a good deal of the time.  She pays her three shilling a day.  We sell about seventy pies a day and after payday, we can sell three times that many, if we had them, and we expect that every day now.  Money is getting pretty scarce with the boys.  We can’t tell how long we shall work in the pie business, but as long as we can get things reasonable, we will. If we could get apples as cheap here as we could out North we could do very well, but apples is four dollars a barrel and flour eight and a half and sugar fourteen cts per pound.  Lard fourteen cts and everything else high. 

            I tell you though I wished you could see our bluff now.  We are a-going to have the nicest place you ever see and a very strong place.  There was part of a Russian fleet went past here the other day.  They lay near at Alexandria.  They though[t] of going to the Navy yard but they draw so much water they think they can’t run up there. Is four of them.  The smallest one draws twenty-seven feet of water.  I tell you they look nice.  There was a monitor [ironclad] went down the river day before yesterday.  We think that the war business looks pretty favorable now but it will be some time yet. In my opinion it depends a good deal on congress now.

            I have traded my old watch off for a revolver and Nancy is practicing on it.  She is getting to be quite a marksman.

            From Charles and Nancy

 

(See a televised reading of the one-act play.)

                I do not have Nancy's exact recipe for those famous bootleg pies, but her great-granddaughter, my mother, is also known throughout the region for her delicious apple pies and has baked many to raise funds for scholarships.  I’ve asked her to share her apple pie recipe.

My mother, like Nancy, makes apple pies in bulk. Nancy and Charles’s farm had apple orchards, so when apples came into season, my mother and grandmother put together several pies and stored them in their large chest freezer that stood in their mudroom. Now my mother owns a similar freezer and fills them with apple pies every fall.

Charles wrote that Nancy made seventy pies a day with the help of others doing the peeling.  My mother believes she probably put some apple filling into one crust, folded it over, pinching the sides together, making small “finger pies.”

Mom's Apple Pie 

Pastry for two crust 9 inch pie:

2 cups flour

1 tsp salt

Generous 2/3 cup shortening (Crisco)

4 - 6 tbsp milk or water

 

Filling
¾ - 1-cup sugar

Dash of salt

1 tsp cinnamon

¼ tsp nutmeg

6 apples

1 tbsp butter

 

Pastry - Sift flour with salt into large bowl.  Cut in shortening with two knives criss-crossing (I use a pastry blender) until pieces are the size of peas.  Add milk one tbsp at a time, stirring gently after each addition. Use just enough liquid to make it possible to gather half of dough together with a well-floured hand.  Too much water and/or too much stirring make pastry tough.  Shape dough with hands into a large thick round disk. Pat down somewhat with hand on a well floured piece of wax paper.  I put the wax paper on a marble slab.  Put more flour on top of dough.  Roll dough with a marble rolling pin.  Roll lightly, but evenly from center to edges.  When pastry is the correct size, pick up wax paper and drape wax paper with dough over right hand (if you are right handed).  Carefully place on pie tin with dough side down.  Gently lift wax paper off dough. If dough sticks in some areas, scrape off with floured knife.  Tears don't matter too much because dough is easy to patch.

Filling - Combine sugar, salt and spices.  Peel, core and thinly slice apples.  Stir in sugar and spices.  Place apples in pie tin making a high rounded dome of the mixture.  Dot with butter.

After filling is placed on bottom pastry in pie tin, put second rolled out pastry on top.  Pinch edges of two crusts together so that it stands up around pie.  Bake in 425F degree oven for about an hour.  Turn down to 400F after 15 min.

I generally spend a day in the kitchen making several pies.  I bake only the pies we will be using within the next couple of days.  The rest are put in freezer unbaked.

The kitchen and I are covered with flour.

Mary Ann McDowell Avazian

Buy Ever True

• From publisher, Heritage Books
• Buy signed copy from author
• Purchase From Amazon

2/10, Mon, 7pm, Civil War Love Letters

Monday, Feb 10, 7pm
Presentation: Ever True: A Union Private and His Wife
Admission: Free and open to the public
New London County Civil War Round Table
Main Auditorium of the Slater Museum
Norwich Free Academy
108 Crescent St.
Norwich, CT  06360
For more information about the program, call Barry Wilson at 860-889-5449 or Vic Busch, Program Director, pvb27@att.net (Most programs last about 45-60 minutes).

The New London Civil War Round Table is hosting Lisa Saunders of Mystic, author of Ever True: A Union Private and His Wife, which features the love letters between Lisa’s great-great grandparents, Charles and Nancy McDowell.  Charles married Nancy when she was 15 years old. Enlisting as a private in the New York 9^th Heavy Artillery two years later, he asked Nancy to save his letters. Despite his grueling battles and marches, he was able to save hers as well. Together, their letters tell of bullets, hangings, prostitutes, venereal disease, typhoid fever, lying injured on the battlefield for days, “clever women,” and the court marshalling of a cow. Ever True is also a “Reader’s Theater,” and Saunders, with the help of the audience, will read several selected letters. (Note: Charles fought in several battles with the 2^nd Connecticut Heavy Artillery in the Sixth Corps.)
 
About the Presenter: Lisa Saunders of Mystic is an award-winning writer, TV host, part-time history interpreter at Mystic Seaport and member of the Daughters of the American Revolution. A graduate of Cornell University, she is the author of several books, including the humorous and historical travel memoir, Mystic Seafarer's Trail. Visit Lisa at: www.authorlisasaunders.com
 
 

1/23/14, Waterford Women’s Club Presents Civil War Love Letters

Author Lisa Saunders of Mystic presents the Civil War love letters featured in the book, Ever True: A Union Private and His Wife, published by Heritage Books. Photo by Collette Fournier.

Free and open to the public

Author Lisa Saunders will present Civil War love letters from her book, Ever True: A Union Private and His Wife published by Heritage Books, to the Waterford Women's Club. The public is invited to attend.

 

Thursday, Jan. 23, 2014, 11 a.m.

Presentation: “Ever True: A Union Private and His Wife”

Waterford Library, lower level

Admission: Free and open to the public

The Waterford Women's Club is hosting Lisa Saunders of Mystic, author of Ever True: A Union Private and His Wife, which features the love letters between Lisa’s great-great grandparents, Charles and Nancy McDowell.  Charles married Nancy when she was 15 years old on Christmas Eve in 1860. Enlisting as a private in the New York 9^th Heavy Artillery two years later, he asked Nancy to save his letters. Despite his grueling battles and marches, he was able to save hers as well. Together, their letters tell of bullets, hangings, prostitutes, venereal disease, “clever women,” and the court marshalling of a cow. Ever True is also a "readers theater." (Charles fought in several battles with the 2^nd Connecticut Heavy Artillery in the Sixth Corps.)

Lisa Saunders of Mystic is an award-winning writer, TV host, and part-time history interpreter at Mystic Seaport. A graduate of Cornell University, she is the author of several books, including the humorous and historical travel memoir, Mystic Seafarer's Trail.

 The Civil War love letters of Private Charles McDowell and his wife Nancy featured in the book, Ever True: A Union Private and His Wife, published by Heritage Books.

Photo by Larry Chester.

 

 Lisa will be joined in the reading of the letters by Captain Marcus John Fisk and Pamela Collins Fisk of New London, Connecticut.

 

Captain Marcus John Fisk has appeared in over 30 stage productions in Virginia, Maryland, Colorado and California. Most recently, Fisk was in A Christmas Carol (Scrooge), Gross Indecency: The Three Trials of Oscar Wilde, 1776, Broadway Bound, and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (George), in the Washington DC area. He authored the book to the Vietnam POW musical, Four Part Harmony, slated for a 2015 NYC production and was the Technical Advisor to the Discovery Channel production, Vietnam POWs: Stories of Survival, which received the 1998 Emmy Award for Best Documentary. He has just completed the screenplay, The Sea Devil, on the life of Count Felix von Luckner, a swashbuckling, chivalric German Officer who raided allied shipping in WWI. A retired Navy Captain and graduate of the Naval Academy, Fisk is a consultant with the Department of the Navy on Special Operations and Irregular Warfare. 

 

Pamela Collins Fisk worked many years as a staffer for Congressman Joe Kennedy and then went on to own and operate a Bed & Breakfast on Nantasket Beach in the Boston area.  She has modeled for various designers doing both runway and print, and was a Historic Interpreter for George Washington’s home at Mount Vernon in Virginia.  She is planning on opening another B&B at her new Victorian home in New London this spring, and is currently finishing her book, The Innkeepers Diary, to be published this summer. Pamela and her husband, Captain Marcus John Fisk, have two sons and a daughter and are expecting their first granddaughter in April. The couple now lives in New London, Connecticut. They can be reached at pcollins0404.pf@gmail.com.

 

See event flyer at: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1WhYlLsRaWuEHvUkuu-2kvwtz6xC9iyBYa0f-BRGJI0Q/edit?usp=sharing

For more information about the event, contact Gay Clarkson, Co-President, Waterford Woman’s Club, at gaywil@cox.net, or Waterford Public Library at 49 Rope Ferry Road Waterford, Connecticut 06385, Tel. 860-444-5805.

###