CXXIX
I AM seated in the sutler’s shop at the prison camp with a whole ream of paper before me, waiting to be written over. The mail got in last night, for a wonder, on time. A warm spell has opened the ice in the river. I got a letter from Frank Morrill, and he writes me, “I want you to assume command of Frances and Nealie when you hear that I am coming home, meet me at the depot and escort me to the house.” [When he came, he came in his coffin, having received mortal wounds the following July.]
We have had a most delightful day, and the boys of Company I have been busy stockading their new Sibley tents. As soon as they move in I will have a post office tent all to myself, and I have got it in my mind now just how it will be rigged up for my business, even to the establishment of an art gallery, the nucleus of which I already have in a highly colored lithograph from a cigar box.
I am messing now with Hen. Everett, who is clerk for the Adjutant, and a fellow named Soseman. We do our own cooking, and as a consequence live better—much better-than we should if we depended entirely on the company cooks and rations. We have beefsteak, baked beans, fritters, and the best coffee on the Point, and gathered about our little mess table at the Adjutant’s quarters, envy no man his share of the good things of life.
Last night I saw about fifty rebels take the oath of allegiance. It was an impressive sight when these men raised their right hands and with uncovered heads swore to support the Constitution and the Government of the United States. They have a camp outside the prison camp and are on practically the same footing that we are.