1862 September 24 Staunton, Va.

[from the diary of Joseph Addison Waddell, civilian employee of the Quartermaster Dept.]

Wednesday, Sept. 24, 1862.

Not an item of news this morning. Raining to- day — very 

welcome. Garden + fields burnt up. News from Europe not 

favorable for intervention. Thos. Carlyle says of the Ameri-

can war that it is "the foulest chimney that's been afire 

this century, and the best way is to let it burn out." — 

Unless European powers do interfere in some way, at least 

acknowledging our independence, that war must go on 

interminably. We cannot go on as at present many 

months longer — exhaustion must soon come, and a 

state of guerilla warfare will ensue. All the wounded 

men who can walk have been creeping up from 

Winchester, trying to get to their respective homes. The 

town is full of them. Many look very forlorn, hands 

and arms hurt, faces bound up, badly clad, bare-

footed and dirty. We are afraid to offer them shelter

 lest they fill the houses with vermin. Only one Hotel 

now, and that crowded to suffocation. Many of the sol-

diers are in much better plight than those described above.

[transcript by the Valley of the Shadow project]

MSS 38-258