Beschreibung:

Lot of 43 Civil War letters from Ohio infantry and cavalry regiments. Majority written by soldiers with some homefront letters providing interesting context of the political turmoil in Ohio. The archive features rare perspectives of camp life and the war and includes battle details especially of action seen in Georgia on Sherman’s Atlanta Campaign. A unique letter is one penned by William S. Friesner (1838-1918) from Licking, Hocking Co. to his paramour Miss Sophie C. Stineman on June 23, 1862. His lengthy 9 page letter is written in entirely in meter and rhyme. He covers his unit’s travels in Tennessee, politics, and expressions of love for Sophie with sophisticated references to Don Quixote, Greek mythology, current events, and more. He muses on the implication of the war, “The hist’ry of our country’s huge game of Euchre /By political gamesters for Uncle Sam’s lucre /And when Southern sharper’s saw threat not the deal /Would save them from losing they took to cold steel.” Friesner served with distinction in the 58th OVI, mustered in as a 2nd Lieut. On Oct. 9, 1861, promoted several times to lieutenant colonel on May 3, 1865. Notably, he was a survivor of the Sultana explosion and testified as a witness for the prosecution. Included in this archive is a letter from John W. Cleland of Company F of the 111th OVI and three letters he received from his family in Lost Creek, Miami Co., OH. The letter exchange provocatively displays the tensions between Copperheads and Abolitionists in the area. Cleland’s family are Democrats, with his sister Jennie in particular being a vocal Southern Sympathizer. In a letter written April 19 and 20, 1864, Cleland’s brother James writes about William J. Knight of the 21st and 115th OVI who was awarded the Medal of Honor for action on April 12, 1862 at the Mitchell Raid. “They had a pretty stormy time of it in the evening I guess. It started from something that had been said about Will Knight. When Will came home Farmer made a great fuss over him; firing their cannon and having a big time generally. They paid great attention to him for a few days but he began to let them know that he was a Democrat. Then they began to cry traitor, Copperhead, Butternut and so on. That done no harm till someone wrote a letter down to his Reg’t. that he had committed treason and was a traitor, and to tell the Paymaster to stop his pay, and such stuff as that. I suppose that William Knight is a brave a boy as ever went to war and has suffered as many hardships as anybody else, and it is a shame for anybody to abuse him as the Abolitionists have him. A party that pretends to be loyal and abuses soldiers as they do just because they do not happen to agree with them politically is what I call abolition consistency. But Will Knight is not the only one that is abused for his political views as you have already found out, and maybe you may find out more yet.” In this letter he also includes a sheet with two pro-Copperhead songs, “A New Dixie: We’ll Live and Die for the Union” with six verses and “Things I Love,” with pro-Vallandigham and anti-Lincoln, Governor Tod, and abolition lyrics including, “I love to hate emancipation /Likewise Old Abe’s Proclamation /I love to think of sixty-four /When Abolition will be o’er.” Cleland, who at the time of writing had been promoted to 2nd lieut., responded to his sister on July 13, 1863 with news about the war, an incident of mistaken identity with the Tennessee home guard, and addresses her political sentiments, “In your last letter of the 29th of June, you say the southern solders are more honorable than the northern soldiers; that the southern soldiers are imposed upon. Well I do say you are getting very sympathizing all at once for the poor Southerners and the poor Negroes you spoke about. I suppose you would hardly acknowledge you had a brother in the northern army, they are such a dishonorable set. I think if you had been in the army pretty near eleven months you would think di