Dear friend walt
I1 received your kind letter & was verry glad to hear from you & to hear that you was well I left the armory hospittal in somewhat of A hurry I went in the ambulance to the depot & took the Cars north at 11 oclock & we got to philadelphia about 2 oclock there we got some bread & ham & coffee we stayed there till three & then we started to harrisburg we got there about dark & stayed there all night the next day we started for Carlisle we got to Carlisle about 10 in the morning we went in to hospittal tents we have rather poor accomodating her[e] the foot is getting better fast I can get around quite smart on it. I think in A few days I Can put on my boots & not hurt me much of anny there is lots of fruits here & Cakes pies &c. but it dont do me much good for I have not got any money to buy it with I wish that you would send me A few of them ten cents noats if you pleas it is verry loansome here to me
I hope that I shall soon gow to my regiment for I dont like to stay here verry well I would like to see you verry well
well walt I dont now as I have anny more to write at present so good by for this time write soon please
Notes
- 1. Bethuel Smith, Company F,
Second U.S. Cavalry, was wounded in 1863. He expected, he explained on September 28, 1863, to rejoin his regiment shortly,
and was stationed near Washington when he wrote on October 13, 1863. He wrote on December 16,
1863, from Culpeper, Virginia, that he was doing provost duty, and on
February 28, 1864, he was in a camp near
Mitchell Station, Virginia, where "the duty is verry hard." He was wounded again
on June 11 (so his parents reported to Whitman on August
29, 1864), was transported to Washington, and went home on furlough on
July 1. He returned on August 14 to Finley Hospital, where, on August 30, 1864, he wrote to Whitman: "I would like
to see you verry much, I have drempt of you often & thought of you oftener
still." He expected to leave the next day for Carlisle Barracks to be mustered
out, and on October 22, 1864, he wrote to Whitman
from Queensbury, New York. When his parents communicated with Walt Whitman on
January 26, 1865, Bethuel was well enough to
perform tasks on the farm. Smith was one of the soldiers to whom Whitman wrote
ten years later; see Whitman's letter to Bethuel Smith, December 1874 (Edwin
Haviland Miller, ed., The Correspondence, 6 vols. [New
York: New York University Press, 1961–77], 2:318–319). [back]