1862 August 3 Gordonsville, Va.

               Camp near Gordonsville
                                    Aug 3 1862
My Darling Wife
                             For some days I have been expect-
ing that every mail would bring me a letter from
home but have been disappointed. I am sure a
letter is on the way and that you would not
suffer two weeks to pass without writing to
me. I wrote to you some ten days ago just after
I got here. It may be that this did not reach
you and you do not know where I am
I am getting to feel used to the army and used
to the idea of staying in it, until I see the
end of the war or it sees the end of me
The work entrusted to me is highly honourable
and very agreeable. I think it will be suff-
icient to keep me employed and make me
as happy as I have ever been in the service.
The only objection to it is that my labour
is gratuitous and I draw no pay. I shall try
and make my expense account as small as possible.

[page 2]
The army is more quiet than I have ever known
it. The enemy have a considerable force some
30 or 40 miles from us amounting possibly to
30,000 men. Their cavalry and ours are occas-
ionally skirmishing, and yesterday had quite        
a severe engagement with one of our regiments    
at Orange C.H. They are said to have had some    
three regiments against our one, and so far as        
I can learn we got the worst of it. No very
serious damage however as our killed and
wounded are only some fifteen.
Today Sunday is very quiet and reminds me
much of a Sunday at home, the usual work being
suspended and every one engaged in sleeping
reading or talking. Formerly there was no Sunday
in the army and every thing went on as usual
on any other day, but now the drills and ordin-
ary work of the week are suspended on Sunday.
Whilst employment here will make me contented
for there is no use in grieving about what must
be borne yet I heartily wish that I was at home
with you and our dear little children. Affection

[page 3]
and sympathy attract me towards home as the dearest
place on earth, but duty to my country and respect for    ]
my own manhood require that I should forego
this happiness until the war ends, as end it
must sooner or later.
I trust Darling that you will be as contented
and happy as you can under the circumstances. The
inconvenience to which you are subjected is just
the same which all other ladies have to bear. You
at least have all the comforts of home and necessaries
of life whilst the wife and little ones of many
a gallant man in the service are miles from
their homes or without the necessaries of life. It
is a poor consolation for your own troubles
that others have worse, but it is alike
the dictate of pity and virtue to bear them
in patience and thus show that you merit a
better fate. The War must end some day. We
may never live to see it. But we owe to ourselves
to cherish the hope that we may one day live
happily together again, that there will be bright
sunshine after the storm which now envelopes us.

[page 4]
Notwithstanding, the rainy days which we have
had in the last two weeks  I trust there has been
dry weather enough in the last two weeks to enable
the hands to finish getting up the hay and that you
have gotten rid of your Irish boarders. I have sold
the hay to Capt Tutwiler the quartermaster at Lexington
at $1 per hundred, to be baled and hauled away
by him. I should like for him to do it
as soon as possible.
I wish the wheat threshed by the machine
which your father gets to thresh Mats
wheat. You can send your hands to help
with his and then get his to help with yours
if your father is willing to do this. As soon as
the wheat is threshed have it hauled to the
mill. Before you commence plowing for
wheat I wish Jack to spend four or five
days in hauling saw logs from the brushy
hill to Zolmans mill. Wm White will
furnish the bill of lumber into which they
are to be sawed which Jack can take to the
Sawmill.
I wish you to manage every thing on the farm
just as you like and I will be satisfied. In
your weekly letters, and you must write
that often, let me know what you have
been doing -
And now Dearest good bye. Remind our
dear little boys of their absent papa
                                        Ever Yours
                                             E F Paxton

[The above letter is written in ink and is somewhat faded. Page four, shown above,
is not included in Civil War Letters of Frank “Bull” Paxton. The original letter is signed
as above and not “Love, Frank” as found in the cited book.]


Elisha F. "Bull" Paxton, University of Virginia alumni and commander of the 27th Virginia Infantry

[transcript by Mary Roy Dawson Edwards]

MSS 2165