Letter 2

Camp near Woodville, Alabama December 31, 1863

Dear Wife,

We have had 4 or 5 mails and no letter from you. I begin to feel lonesome but hope I shall get a letter next time. You have been saying in your letters that you did not get any from me so you see how I feel, only I don’t have the children for company. I hope you get my letters more regularly by this time and I hope you will for the future but we cannot expect them always to be regular. I sent a letter to Philadelphia a month ago or more and the sent me

word that they sent me their catalog but I never got it. I sent again to them yesterday for a pair of specs and sent two dollars so as to get them with a case so they will not spoil by carrying in my pocket as the other ones did. I don’t think I use them quite so much as I did unless the smoke bothers me which is a good deal of the time. I have sent ten dollars to R.R. Miller and Company for what is called applications. They are kind of lottery tickets. I want them to

sell. They cost ten cents each and sell for twenty or twenty five cents each. Sergeant Valon is going to sell them and he and I go halves. I guess I will make five dollars I hope tho speculation but may not.

I cannot get any stamps lately but hope to get some before long. Tomorrow is New Years Day and many great calculations will be made and some of them kept.

I mean to send all my wages and George’s to pay up the debts on the farm or to make fence or buy what is needed at home. If we are well I guess we can do on but if sick we will have to use some to live here. I have some money on hand that I mean to buy things with to sell or else lend it so as to make more than the ten percent here.

One of the boys offered to give 4 dollars in two months for 3 dollars now but I don’t like lending if I can make any thing in trade. I sent five dollars to New York for a gold pen in a silver holder and two gold pens without holders. I sold one pen for 2.10 and the other for 2.50 so that the pen and the holder that I have cost me only 40 cents. I can sell pens for 2 or 3 dollars and perhaps I shall send for more.

George wants Johns watch sent down if you got it fixed. I thought it was mine that you got fixed. You can send it by Parvas Hillyard if you leave it at the Burlington House for us fairly soon. We need a watch very much. When we have to stay up on guard and hour in the night they make us stay two hours in the rain sometimes because we don’t know when our time is out. Send

either one and you can get the other one fixed if you want to. If you have let Fisher have any money so as to get out yourself let me know and I will send you more. All you let Fisher have stops so much interest. Don’t keep much more than you need by you but let it stop interest.

You make a noble wife for me and I only tell you these things so you may know about some of our business that you don’t understand so well as I. I will risk you when you understand things. Did you have to pay the expenses for either of those boxes that I paid once?

I have just got ordered to go out on picket to watch for rebels so I will close this letter. The mail came in just now but nothing for me. We have no snow but some awful cold weather. I wish you all a Happy New Year.

Good Night; J. A. Dennis