Following are two July 1861 letters written by members of Co. A, 1st Regiment Virginia Infantry (3 Months). The first letter was written by John I. McCook and the second letter was by Capt. Mountford Samuel Stokely (1836-1902), both residents of Steubenville, Jefferson county, Ohio. Mountford (or “Mont”) was an 1857 graduate of Marietta College. In 1860 he was working as a lawyer in Steubenville. John I. McCook (b. 1843) was the son of Brigadier General George Wythe McCook (1821-1877), an attorney in Steubenville just prior to the Civil War.

These letters were written a month after the Battle of Philippi in which the Federal forces under General Kelley had routed the Confederates in the first land battle of the war.

Letter 1

[Editor’s note: This letter was written by John I. McCook]

Philippi [Virginia]
July 1st 1861

To our friends and the public generally:

Being compelled by stern necessity to board ourselves and finding sutlery impossible to obtain the necessaries much less the luxuries of life in this uncivilized and benighted corner of the world, and placing implicit confidence in the generosity of our friends, therefore, unanimously

Resolved. That our pitiable condition should excite the sympathies of all good people everywhere.

Resolved. That Flitch and short cake will do for fifty or sixty meals but as articles of steady diet, won’t do so well.

Resolved. That coffee is not fit to drink without sugar and sugar is not good to eat without coffee.

Resolved. That it is a shame that strawberry and blackberry season should pass away without our enjoying any of its fruits.

Resolved. That although we are soldiers, we have not quite forgotten how to eat fresh fruit and vegetables.

Resolved. That as our friends know better than we do what would be most agreeable to us, we leave the whole matter to them, merely giving them in addition to the above hints.

Table of our wants.

Boiled tongue—half dozen.
Boiled hams—1 dozen
Unboiled ham—2 dozen
Dried beef—unlimited

Vegetables

Potatoes—1 bushel
Onions—half peck
Peas—1 peck
Beans—half peck
Dried peaches—ad lib.

Can Fruits & Vegetables—All kinds
Coffee—Cummin’s browned & ground—lots

Extras (not on the Bill of Fare)
Tobacco (meanest quality smoking) for Orth
Segars—Tobies for company

Can’t think if anything else at present. Put your heads together and see if you can’t. Small favors thankfully received. Large ones in proportion. Would ask for more but modesty forbids.

Address to Capt. M. S. Stokely, care of Thos. Singleton, Grafton, Virginia

Additional

P. S. — Latest from the seat of war.
1 coffee pot
1 frying pan
1 tin sauce pan
4 tin plates
4 tin cups
4 knives and forks
4 tin spoons (large)

P. S. S. — Still later

A large amount of postage stamps. Won’t write unless you send them. Reason why. Can’t get them here.
1 Barlow knife.

Signed, John I. McCook, Mont. S. Stokely, G. H. Orth (his mark)

Very latest—More tobacco for Orth

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Letter 2

[Editor’s note: This letter was written by Mountford S. Stokely]

Camp near Philippi
July 4, 1861

My dear sister,

Your most welcome letter has been received some days ago and should have been answered before this. I have taken my pencil and paper with a secession atlas—a trophy of Philippi—and stolen away from camp up into a pleasant grove to reply now. This is our glorious Fourth of July and as for me, I wish no better way of celebrating it, or rather, of enjoying than by writing to you. How strange it us that for the last eight Fourths of July I have been absent from home, making nine years since I spent one in Steubenville. Perhaps the last two were spent the most pleasant of any. This one would have excelled them all if only you and our Lieutenant’s sisters could have come out and spent it with us.

When I received your letter on Saturday speaking about your visiting us, I became very anxious to have you do so and walked out into the country two miles to find a place where you could be pleasantly kept over night. I found a neat farm house where they said they would be glad to have you stay. You write as if you were in Grafton but we are 16 miles from there. Still we do have one hack with real springs to it running daily between there and here. Besides, I could have gone over to Grafton for you with the greatest of pleasure. Indeed, I was on the point of getting a pass for you and five or six others from General Morris and writing for you all to come and spend the 4th of July with us, when our Col. [Henry B.] Hubbard told me we would likely march before then. Still I did not like to give it up and went to find the wagon master who has charge of all our transportation, and with whom I have managed to make good friends. He told me confidentially—for all our movements are kept secret—that he had orders to have teams ready to move the entire brigade in 24 hours. This made me think we really were going and I reluctantly gave up the idea of the visit. How very pleasant it might have been for here we are now this bright day without any more symptoms of moving than there was a week ago, and you all might have been here as well as not.

Yesterday, tis true, we had quite another alarm. Volley after volley was heard at one end of the camp and of course we were soon all under arms, 5000. The ammunition distributed, muskets loaded & bayonets fixed, ready for the onslaught, but nobody came. T’was only practicing firing of two or three companies that made all the hubbub.

I suppose you begin to think we have nothing but constant alarms, but this is the only one since writing to you last.

Col. Robert McCook of Cincinnati passed through here the other day with his Dutch regiment. He is the only American in it and I guess he wishes he was out. He has encamped six miles off. The fires of his camp can be seen at night above the treetops although nothing else.

John McCook, our Lieutenant, was put on McClellan’s staff as assistant quartermaster which he might have held for three years at a good salary. I was just beginning to say “How lucky the McCooks all are,” when back John came to our company, having resigned his quartermastership in disgust.

I was not at all surprised at your letter as well as the papers noticing the great difference in the commands of the regular and of the volunteer officers at the Battle of Vienna. The volunteer General Order to “Rally for Ohio” was as characteristic as McCook’s to “Rally to the Reserve.” There is indeed the greatest difference in even the tones. In vain do the volunteer officers attempt to imitate the West Point sounds, “They can’t do it.” It sounds like the parrot and everyone detects it at once.

We have been very unfortunate in the loss of Col. [Benjamin Franklin] Kelley and still more so in the election of our Lieut. Colonel. Of course I voted with my eyes blindfolded for I never heard of the man and voted for him only because there was but two candidates. One was a captain in our regiment whom I knew to be a fool and this man [Henry Baldwin] Hubbard. I had never seen and thought it would be better to take the chances of a stranger. Our choice was, however, quite unfortunate. I find since he has come out that he is entirely ignorant of even the words of command, and the only recommendation I can discover he ever had is that he was a captain of a fire company either in Wheeling or Wellsburg. And indeed belongs to that class of men. If they have none better in all Western Virginia, I think they had better import from other states. I would rather be under Capt. Webster or John H. Trainer. None of our officers have the least confidences in his knowledge or rather ignorance of all military tactics and each one of us will try to take care of ourselves and company if we get into an engagement, There is perhaps one remedy I thought of yesterday. That ism as Col. Kelley has been promoted to General of a brigade, to elect another Colonel which will take the authority out of the Lieutenant Colonel’s hands, you know.

I suppose that we did not receive our tents till last week. Till then the men and officers of the 1st Virginia Regiment had to sleep wherever they could get, most of them lying in huts built of boughs of the trees. So long as the weather was good, it did well enough. But 24 hours rain one day made all the boys sick and they swore they would stand it no longer. Our tents came that night or else there would have been a regular stampede, like that of Sickles Brigade in New York. The tents and pleasant weather have made the boys quite well again and cheerful.

I intend paying you a visit as soon as there is no prospect of an engagement. I have been writing here on a big rock in the woods undisturbed for two hours and must go down into camp to see how they are keeping the Fourth. Give my love to all, both little Monty and Willie. Tell Willie I will bring him the hobby horse Grandpa promised. Perhaps you have see McCook’s letter. We were troubled so much by our friends asking what they should send that we gave play to any imaginations. Your affectionate brother, — M. S. Stokely