all the jewelry this army has could be carried to the Old Bay State. It would deck her out in glorious style; but, alas! it will be scattered all over the North and Middle States.
"The damned niggers, as a general thing, preferred to stay at home, particularly after they found out that we wanted only the able-bodied men, and to tell the truth, the youngest and best looking women. Sometimes we took them off by way of repaying influential secessionists. But a part of these we soon managed to lose, sometimes in crossing rivers, sometimes in other ways. I shall write you again from "Wilmington, Goldsboro, or some other place in North Carolina. The order to march has arrived, and I must close hurriedly.
"Love to grandmother and Aunt Charlotte. Take care of yourself and the children. Don't show this letter out of the family.
"Your affectionate husband,
"P.S.—I will send this by the first flag of truce, to be mailed, unless I have an opportunity of sending it to Hilton Head. Tell Lottie I am saving a pearl bracelet and earrings for her. But Lambert got the necklace and breast-pin of the same set. I am trying to trade him out of them. These were taken from the Misses Jamison, daughters of the President of the South Carolina Secession Convention. We found these on our trip through Georgia.
"This letter is addressed to Mrs. Thomas J. Myers, Boston, Mass."
It was published in the Southern Historical Society Papers, in March, 1884. About a year thereafter one Colonel Henry Stone, styling himself "Late Brevet Colonel U. S. Volunteers, A. A. G. Army of the Cumberland," realizing the gravity of the statements contained in this letter, and the disgrace these, if uncontradicted, would bring on General Sherman and his army,
