August 22d, 1863.
I had comforted myself with the reflection that when we returned to Kentucky, where communications were uninterrupted by guerillas, and were only separated by twenty-four hours of time, I might be permitted to correspond with my family without such harrowing delays, for I would not have my darling in doubt as to my situation or whereabouts for one single day, knowing, as I do, the uncertainty of suspense is worse than the reality. But ’tis said, “The darkest hour is just before the dawn,” and, even as I write, my mind filled with dark thoughts, a ray of light from my Northern home flashes across my vision. The whole current of my thought is changed, and thankfulness takes the place of my repining. Thankfulness that it is as well with my beloved ones as it is. Oh, that I could remove every burden, and make their pathway smooth and flowery. I find most of our trials are imaginary, but none the less real for being so. For instance, my beloved wife’s imagination pictures me on my weary way back to old Virginia’s blood-stained fields, subject to every hardship, exposed to every danger, and her suffering could be no greater if it were so. On the contrary, I am still in Kentucky, in a pleasant, shady grove, enjoying a season of welcome quiet and repose, soft bread to eat, plenty of pure, cold water to drink. What more could mortals crave. The newspapers were right, as far as they went, about our being ordered to the Potomac. We did receive such orders, but General Burnside telegraphed the War Department the Ninth Corps had marched, during the year, an average of twenty miles a day; that it had just returned from an exhausting campaign in Mississippi; that the men were worn down by fatigue and sickness, and were unfit for active service, and asked that they be allowed to remain here for a season. His request was granted. One year has passed since I left my pleasant home to serve my country—a year big with the fate of millions yet unborn—a year the most eventful in our history; perhaps in the world’s history.
