Letter from Luther Bruen, Nokesville, VA to Augusta Bruen, 1864-02-12
Nokesville Feby 12th 64 My Dear Wife: I have rec'd no letter from you since Sunday, consequently I am anxious to hear from you and home. I have been making myself "comfortable" this week as Capt. Dallas would say. My tent is now a pleasant thing to behold. I am no longer confined to the "cramped up Utica" of a single wall tent, but enjoy the glorious expansiveness of two. These are set on logs about five feet high, so that I have a commodious room about twenty feet long and ten feet wide. It is well floored and tight and warm and preferable to the *houde* in which most of my staff are quartered. I have a good bed on which I sleep quite soundly and *dive* little conveniences which I have not heretofore enjoyed. Besides, I have a first servant who takes excellent care of me and who is equal to almost anything from mending my breeches to building a house. I have no scoldings in my domestic kingdom -- everything is done to my hand before I can ask for it. Our mess is a very good one. We have all the vegetables that can be bought in our neighborhood besides what the Commissary has for sale, chicken (rather old however) nice fresh eggs and a very good cook who makes the best hash I ever ate. We are in close communication with Alexandria where we can get whatever is in the market there. So, you see, we are not altogether miserable, tho' we lead a monotonous life which in time will reduce one to the mental capacity of an oyster I suppose, if indeed we have not reached that point already. -- 13th -- Your letter of the - of Feby, postmarked the eighth, but not dated, came to hand this evening. It seems to require five days for a letter to travel from you to me; are mine quite as long on the way? -- We are going along in the old monotonous joy. To-morrow (Sunday) there is to be a flag-raising in the camp of the 12th, at which four barrels of ale are to be guzzled. There will probably be a good time. -- The Third Infantry are ordered to Fort Columbus. Capt. Lay had been ordered on mustering and disbursing service at Trenton N.J. before and he and his wife are there now. The departure of the 3rd will make it necessary to make some changes in the location of the troops of my brigade. This is very disgusting to every body. The 12th have the prettiest camp in the army and they are pretty proud of it. Any change that can be made will affect them more or less. The other regiments too have been laboring for months to get themselves comfortable and it is too bad that they should be compelled to leave their camps and obliged to make new ones again and for the third time since we came on the lines of the railroad. -- Good morrow, Sweet Valentine! I wrote the last installment of this letter about midnight, leaving it incomplete because I had nothing more to say and keeping it open until this #morning, merely to enable me to call it a Valentine. You can't say now I have never sent you one. Tell Elizabeth I hope to send her the ferns next week, that is if I can find any. Goodbye Love, L.B.B.#
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February 12, 1864
Bruen, Luther Barnett
Nokesville, VA
4 pages
United States -- History -- Civil War, 1861-1865
Bruen, Luther Barnett -- Correspondence
Catharine Mitchill '31 Collection of Family Letters, Wellesley College Library, Special Collections
MSS.6.275
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http://repository.wellesley.edu/mitchill/275
