The following letter was written by Henry Clark Alverson (1843-1920), the son of William Alverson (1811-1898) and Rhoda Snow (1820-1888) of Beloit, Rock county, Wisconsin.

Henry served as a private in Co. B., 40th Wisconsin Infantry—a 100 days regiment organized in the summer of 1864. Henry enlisted on 17 May 1864 and was promoted to commissary sergeant on 8 August 1864. He mustered out of the service on 16 September 1864 at Milwaukee. After the war, Henry relocated to Des Moines, Iowa, where he got into the insurance business.

The duties of the regiment included garrison, railroad guard and picket duty around Memphis. They did participate in repulsing the Confederate attack on Memphis in late August 1864.

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Headquarters 40th Regiment Wisconsin Vols.
Camp Ray [Tennessee]
July 14, 1864

Dear Mother,

I thought I would wile away a few moments in writing to you . I am as well as usual and so are all of the men in our company except a very few who are troubled with the summer complaint which is as common as negroes. We had lost one man when I wrote you before and we lost another the same night that I wrote to you, and there are a good many that are pretty sick now and some of them are dangerous. But for our company, they are the best appearing company in the regiment and they can stand more duty than a great many companies for some reason or other.

Our detail for guards and pickets is very near half of our effective force. I think there is not much danger of our moving away from here at present for we are doing just what we enlisted for. But it makes a good many of the boys growl to have to be on picket every other day and night. If they won’t give us anything to do than what we have done so far, I think there is not much cause to complain.

Mother, I tell you that they have a right smart chance for women down here in this God forsaken country. They way these women can just get up and curse a Yankee is a caution to Northern soldiers. They will take a stick and bottle and have the bottle filled with snuff, dip the stick in the snuff, and then chew it, and spit worse than old Goodwin. ¹ Oh! deliver me from ever living in this country after this war is over, which I think is not closed yet by a great many dozens.

We have very bad news from Maryland and thereabouts. Charlie got a letter from Ira last night. Ira is having a tip top time and wrote Charlie a large letter of advice and so forth. A good many of the boys are getting boxes from home and I thought if you got a chance to send a little dried fruit, it would be very acceptable. We have a good many blackberries now but they charge the awfullest price for everything to buy. But I must close for it is most time to deliver the fresh beef to the regiment.

Regards to all, — H. C. A.

Ask George Haight if he ever got my letter and if he did, why he don’t write. I will just boot him when I get back. I have heard from Nelson and from Madison and from York State and from several in the neighborhood and they all seem to be having a good time as well as we.

Did you get the picture I sent of cousin Ellen Snow and the enrolled men of our company? If you did, I wish you would just state it for my benefit. Please answer this as soon as you receive and oblige your son, — H. C. Alverson

to Rhoda Alverson

¹ “According to numerous observers of the time, the most distinctive characteristic that set apart many Southern women from their Northern sister’s was their fondness for tobacco. Time & again, Federal soldiers commented about encounters with snuff-dipping or pipe-smoking women & girls in the Confederacy, & the habit occasionally prompted remarks from regional sources as well.” [Source: The Social Dip: Tobacco Use by Mid-19th Century Southern Women]

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