Tuesday, January 14, 2014

December 10, 1863


December 10, 1863


---Jenkin Lloyd Jones, a Federal artilleryman from Wisconsin, is in camp in northern Alabama, near Chattanooga.  He writes in his journal about the tedium of camp life, in between campaigns:


Bridgeport, Thursday, Dec. 10. Sun so hot as to be quite warm. Much like a spring day in Wisconsin. Everybody lively and full of fun, troubled with nothing but “nothing to do”, which to me is a serious cup. Gambling among the indulging ones quite brisk. Watches and pens raffled for, etc. A chuckluck doing big business was surprised by a guard in Osterhaus’s camp this afternoon and the boys taken to the headquarters of the Division under guard. The idleness and monotony of camp is fearfully demoralizing to many, and inevitably leads to the gaming table if indulged in.

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