kind Sir as we1 have recieved your letter you sent to Bethuel I will rite a few lines in this and send it to you which is Bethuel's own hand riting he was wounded the 11 of June in his right leg a little above his nee he rode in a government wagon 4 Days then on about one Day and night then he came to Washington he got a furlow the first Day of July for forty Days at which period he returned to Washington to the hosptial he was very thin in flesh but looked some better when he left home his health was not very good and if the [hospital] saves his life we expect him home again next month this from his parents
P.S. we will send your letter to Bethuel immediately we would be very glad to see you and are thankful to you for your kindness towards our son Come and make us a visit we live 5 miles from Glensfalls West
Notes
- 1. Christopher and Maria
Smith were the parents of Bethuel Smith, Company F, Second U.S. Cavalry, who was
wounded in 1863 and met Whitman shortly after. He wrote to Whitman on September 17, 1863, from the U.S. General Hospital
at Carlisle, Pennsylvania, "I left the armory hospital in somewhat of A hurry."
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, 1864, as this letter states. He 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, N.Y. 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 Walt Whitman to Bethuel Smith, December 1874 (Edwin
Haviland Miller, ed., The Correspondence [New York: New
York University Press, 1961–77], 2:318–319). [back]