This letter was penned in late March 1863 from the Confederate encampment near Shelbyville where Gen. Bragg had retreated after the Battle of Stones River to establish a strong defensive line along the Duck River. It was written by Major Lee Graves (1831-1904) of Co. I, 1st Tennessee, who enlisted on 31 July 1861 at Trenton, Tennessee. Following the Battle of Perryville where they lost many men, the 1st Tennessee was consolidated with the 27th Tennessee Infantry and Graves was then transferred into Co. G as a corporal. Graves was born in North Carolina but by 1850 he was living in District 17, Henderson county, Tennessee—about halfway between Nashville and Memphis. That census record informs us that his parents were Azariah Graves (1784-1868) and Penelope Simpson (1793-1856). He wrote the letter to his “brother” who must have been his younger brother, Thomas J. Graves.

In his letter, Graves speaks of being in battle where the air was “blue” with an “iron hailstorm.” Surely he must be referring to the Battle of Stones River where the 1st-27th Tennessee Infantry were attached to Ben Cheatham’s Division, Army of Tennessee, and suffered 83 total casualties fighting around the railroad and cedar thickets.

A copy of this letter was sent to me by Paul Lindsey of Jackson Tennessee, who asked me to transcribe it for Spared & Shared. Paul says the original letter is with a cousin in Huntsville Alabama.

T R A N S C R I P T I O N

Camp near Shelbyville [Tennessee]
March 26th, 1863

Now my dear brother, I this evening take the present opportunity of writing you a few lines to inform you that I am still in the land of the living and enjoying reasonable health. Hoping at the same time that these few lines may come to hand in due time and find you enjoying the same like blessing.

I have nothing interesting to say at present but hard times and worse coming. I have been [through] many ups and down since you saw me last and still the war goes on and I have looked for peace in vain until I have quit looking and there has been so man good men slain on our side and in my company. Out of eighty-six men in our company, but ten remains in camps.

I have marched many miles since you saw me last. Our trip in Kentucky was a very severe tramp. Still yet, it had its pleasures as well. [paper torn obliterating one line]…myself very well at times and then at other times the world went very hard. It was like everything—it had its sweets and then bitters. There is not anything very sweet where the shells flys so thick [that] the air looks blue. It seems more like an iron hail storm than anything I can compare it to and God grant that I may never witness the like again.

I want you to write to me every chance you get to send a letter through. [paper torn obliterating a line]…for you to give every man that belongs to our company a particular hint that he ought to rally to his post and that we want them to come—and particularly give J. T. Messerson more plainly G. T. Daulton.

Give my best love to all the family [paper torn] or that [ ] with his Maker if ever I get back to that country. Write as soon as you get this without fail.