Virginia December 7th 1861
Dear Father and mother Sisters
and Brothers I Take my pen in
hand to inform You all That I am
Well at present time Thanks Be to God
For his mercies Be Stowed on us For I
have Good health Now and have had for
A Good while and we all feel Saddisfied here
For we have Nice weather hear we had A Litle
Snow But it Did hardley Cover the Ground
it fell in the Evening and A Gain 9 oclock it
was all Gone and Now it is Nice A Gain the
weather is A Bout as cool here as on the mountain
in october So I have Not much To write this time
But I will tell you A Little A Bout the times
here Yesterday we was out on A forging
Expedition and we had 53 wagons with us
and we went A Bout 12 miles out in the
Secesion parts and we had A Bout 6 thousand
Soldiers A Long and 16 pieces of Canon we
Loaded all of the wagons with Corn and wheat
and oats hogs Potatoes and Every thing we could Get we Got A Bout 15 horses and A yoke oxen
we Got them with in About 2 miles of
the Secesions But they were A fraid to [attack us?]
[page 2]
we all Like to Go out forging for we
Get tired Laying in our Camp and we
Cant Get Enney Chance to fight But we
all would Like if we could Get a chance
To Kill Some of them mean scamps for
I think they will Soon Give up A Bout
one more Good fight will fetch them So
we all feel Like [if?] we will all Be home
A Gain Next April But we Do Not think
of Coming home as Long as this war Lasts
There is Not much Sickness here Yet there
was one of our men Got Sick the other
Day and they took him to the hospitle
and on they Road they up Set and hurt
him and he Died in A Day or Two But
we have Good Doctors here we can Get
Evry thing we want or we Can Go to the Doctor Every morning I have Seen Soffary
hefley 4 or 5 times and he Looks harty
he is in the 8th Regimint and I Seen
Sam Smith he is in the 49th Regiment
we have Plenty to eat and Drink So we
Cant Complain and Plenty to wear
I have more Clothes Now then ever I had
At one time [??] and our Pants are of
fine stuff
[page 3]
I Got one Letter from
Brother John and I have
Some from Danniel [Celenndear?]
Just Some times I think I will
Get one from Some of them this
Evening Tell Philip Gray when
he writes A Gain to poot his Name
to his Letter and Not Do as he Did
the other time and I want You to
Tell me ho has Gone to war from there
For I Cant hear ho has went or ho
hasent for I Do Not know if Caleb
Gray is at home or Soldering So I want
You to tell me Corect this time So I
will know and if they are Gone
to near So I Can write to them But
You must Give me the Direction
for I Do Not know where they are
For we are in the Suthaner part of
virginia So Nothing more at present
time But I Remain Your Son
Pleas Write Soon Good By to all my friends
[page 2]
Boys are all well
we Got 7 Secesions
Yestrday

Philip A Lantzy
To mother
[1] Direct Your Letter
to washing as usual
[2] union Gun
Ples write Soon
Give my Respects to [?weener?]
I was 21 Day Before Yesterday


union Canon
That is the way we make them Secesions
Secesions Run