December 31. [Chattanooga] —The last day of 1862— how teeming with wonderful events has been the past year!
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“How many precious souls have fled
To the vast regions of the dead,
Since to this day the changing sun
Through his last yearly period run.”
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The South has suffered, O, how terribly! Thousands and tens of thousands of precious lives have been sacrificed to the god of war. In every state of our beloved land there has been a temple erected to the insatiate Moloch. This is not all: women and children have been left homeless, and driven out into the pitiless storm, and even the bitterest frowns of nature have had more kindness in them than the hearts of our ruthless invaders. The inspired bard of Scotia has graphically described our case:
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“Blow, blow, ye winds, with heavier gust!
And freeze, thou bitter-biting frost!
Descend, ye chilly, smothering snows!
Not all your rage, as now, united shows
More hard unkindness, unrelenting,
Vengeful malice unrelenting,
Than heav’n-illum’d man on brother man bestows;
See stern oppression’s iron grip,
On mad ambition’s gory hand,
Sending, like blood-hounds from the slip,
Woe, want, and murder o’er our land!
E’en in the peaceful rural vale,
Truth, weeping, tells the mournful tale.
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How hard it is to think of all this, knowing that the above is an “owre true tale,” without feeling hate, bitter hate, toward those who are the cause of it! We were more than mortal were it otherwise, but I trust that with it all we will leave vengeance to Him to whom it belongs.
Amid all this suffering the star of hope for our cause shines brighter and brighter, although in the West we have lost much territory. Our armies are improving every way. They are better clad and better fed than they were. We have much sickness, but nothing to what we have had.
Life in camp has improved, physically and morally. The medical department has also improved. Surgeons have to be thoroughly examined before receiving commissions. Congress has passed a law, making provision for ladies (where they can be had) to take charge of the domestic arrangements in hospitals.
Manufactories have arisen where before the war they were not known. Women, who thought such things impossible, are making shoes and knitting-socks. In every farm-house the spinning-wheel and loom is heard. Fields are teeming with grain, where once grew cotton and tobacco. We have enough vessels running the blockade to keep us in tea and coffee, and cattle from Texas to keep us in beef. In fact, if the war lasts much longer, we will be the most independent people in the world.
Although we have lost many great and good men, numbers have risen to take their place. The foe have work yet before them; they have to conquer Lee, Jackson, Longstreet, Hill, and a host of others in Virginia, with their invincible armies.
Beauregard at Charleston; Hindman and Price in the far west; the ubiquitous Morgan; and last, though by no means least, the army of Tennessee, and its veteran commanders, Johnston and Bragg. I have not forgotten noble little Vicksburg and her heroic defenders; with these and God’s blessing, I trust that the time is not far distant, when dove-eyed peace will hover o’er our now distracted land.
Mr. Burgess, a member of the battery my brother is in, called this evening and left some money for Mrs. W., a Christmas donation from Mrs. Otis of Mobile. It is rumored a battle has commenced at Murfreesboro. May God give us the victory!
