The following letter was written by Pvt Thomas R. Martin, Co. F, 10th Virginia Cavalry (1st Cavalry Regiment, Wise Legion) to his mother. Thomas enlisted as a private at North Garden, Virginia, in April 1861 and reenlisted at Richmond the following year. Prior to January of 1863, he was promoted to First Corporal. He was promoted again, this time to Third Sergeant, prior to November 1863. Close to the end of war, Martin was wounded at the Battle of Five Forks, in April 1865.

When this letter was penned in mid-July 1861 at Charleston, Virginia (now West Virginia), the 10th Virginia Cavalry had not yet been organized. Thomas was a member of the Rockbridge Mounted Rangers that were part of Gen. Henry A. Wise’s Brigade. Their uniform was described as a “gray sack coat, gray shirt and pants, and a drab slouch hat.”

Transcription

Charleston [Virginia]
July 15, 1861

Dear Ma,

We arrived here last night after a severe forced march of 31 miles without stopping to feed as we were met by a messenger who said that the troops from Ohio were 17 miles from this place and were advancing. Yesterday a skirmish took place 13 miles below here but I understand no one was hurt on either side & the Yankees retreated. We start from here this morning and expect a fight very shortly and are preparing for it.

I will give you a list of my debts at Salem in case of an accident. I owe Mr. Campbell $22 for my pistol & other things. If you look in my black cloak pocket, you will find Mr. Holland’s bill. It comes to $26. And I owe Mr. George Stevens $3. This is all I owe.

This is a beautiful country and there are splendid crops here. Yesterday we passed the oil works & also the salt works but had not time to examine them. The people out here are mostly Union men and they look at us as if they would kill us if they could, and others of them cheer for Jeff Davis but you can see they have no heart in it while our true men could be known by the joy depicted on their countenances. In town here we have been treated very shabbily and have paid no attention to us whatever and we could not even get a bit of supper by paying for it. We had to eat like dogs on the corner of the street and such a supper I never did eat & hope never to eat again. I thought we had hard eating in camp but our cooking is good to what that was last night.

I am very well but want sleep badly. Wise has given us liberty to take horses & everything else from the Yankees and the Union men. ¹ I expect we will thrash the Yankees like everything or they will have to shoot better than they have yet. I have no idea of being killed and expect to bring any quantity of mementos of the war home with me.

I wrote to you by Mr. Hartsook two days since and will write again after the fight—if we have one. I must close. Write to Charleston, care of Capt. D., Rock[bridge] Rangers, and I suppose I will get it. I haven’t heard from you but I suppose I haven’t had time to do so. Write soon. Love to all. Your affectionate son, — J. Thos R. Martin

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¹ The statement that Gen. Wise has “given us liberty to take horses and everything else from the Yankees and the Union men” is surprising as he had strict orders from the Confederate War Department to “protect the personal and property rights of the inhabitants” in the Kanawha Valley. Stealing from the civilians, whether they were pro-Union or not, would only further alienate the region, reasoned the politicians in Richmond. Wise’s correspondence makes it clear that he despised the pro-Union residents in the Valley; he called them “traitors” and “copperheads.”