They Had No Market; No Shops At
Which To Make Purchases, Even If They Had Money To Buy; No Customers
With Whom To Deal, Even If They Had Produce To Sell.
They had their
cows, if they could keep them from the Confederate soldiers, their
pigs and their poultry; and on them they were living - a most forlorn
life.
Any advance made by either party must be over their
homesteads. In the event of battle, they would be in the midst of
it; and in the mean time they could see no one, hear of nothing, go
nowhither beyond the limits of that miserable strip of ground!
The earth was hard with frost when I paid my visit to the camp, and
the general appearance of things around my friend's quarters was on
that account cheerful enough. It was the mud which made things sad
and wretched. When the frost came it seemed as though the army had
overcome one of its worst enemies. Unfortunately cold weather did
not last long. I have been told in Washington that they rarely have
had so open a season. Soon after my departure that terrible enemy
the mud came back upon them; but during my stay the ground was hard
and the weather very sharp. I slept in a tent, and managed to keep
my body warm by an enormous overstructure of blankets and coats; but
I could not keep my head warm. Throughout the night I had to go
down like a fish beneath the water for protection, and come up for
air at intervals, half smothered.
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