August 6, 1863

August 6, 1863

Letter from Chauncey Herbert Cooke, August 6, 1863Dear Father:

I wrote to you but three days ago, but I am glad for an excuse to write to you again. I got your last letter with the extract from the New York Tribune enclosed. I am not surprised that old Greely, as the boys call him, would have something to say about the New York riot. He feels terribly because of the late riots against the negroes in New York City.

I showed the extract to Dwyer, an Irishman in our company, a real good fellow, and one of my best friends. He said O'Connell himself could not make the Irish like "Nigers." He said, when O'Connell talked to the Irish in Ireland about Liberty, it was all right, but it was asking too much for O'Connell or anybody else to fight for the liberty of the nigger. He did blame the Irish though, for their part in burning the schools and asylums of the blacks in New York City. The boys had been talking this thing over a good deal since the New York riot. It must have hurt Wendell Phillips dreadfully after all the handsome things he has said about O'Connell and English oppression of the Irish nation to see them so bitterly opposed to the freedom of the slave.

I told Dwyer I didn't see how he or any other Irishman could feel kindly toward the south, that had never made them welcome nor had they treated any foreign people as kindly as we had done in the north. Their papers were always sneering at the Dutch or Hessians, the Jews and the Irish.

Dwyer said, the Irish don't hate the Nigger because he is black but because he won't fight. The Irish like a fighter. Dwyer has always cursed Lincoln because he was so slow to enlist the blacks in the army. I don't know but he was right. Lincoln seems to be a good man but he is slow. Things seem to be in a terrible jangle at Washington. There is so much jealousy among the officers and backbiting to Lincoln that the poor fellow don't know who to trust. The Vicksburg papers up to the time of the surrender, were always sneering at the Yankees and saying that if the South was beaten it would be owing to the foreign hirelings, that we were bringing in by the ship load, to fill up our ranks. Most of their spite is against the Germans, whom they call Hessians.

Well, so much for the comments in the Tribune extract you sent me. I have little to say about our doings here. Most of us are sick. We simply lay round and sleep and dream and gaze out on the big river that never stops but flows on and on toward the gulf. Just below our camp is a big flat boat loaded with ice. They came from the Ohio. They ask five cents for enough ice to cool a drink of water. There is a lot of cows in the edge of town and the boys milk them every day. Thompson Pratt and Obed Hilliard brought me some milk the day before yesterday. I bought a pound of [p. 56]ice and cooled it and with hard tack for bread I had a royal good meal.

Say, how are things at home Of course you are having venison these days and plenty of trout. Give old Prince a good hug for me. Dear old dog. I often think of the days and nights we hunted together. I never feared anything the darkest night that ever blew when out in the hills with old Prince snugged up in the blanket beside me. He has been the dearest friend of my boyhood and if anything happens to him bury him on the big hill and I will mark his grave if I come back. Tell mother never mind sending the butter. It's too fearful hot. There is a rumor that a lot of our regiment will be sent to the hospitals at Memphis soon. I hate to think that I may be one of that number. I think I am feeling better since the weather got cooler. Love to all,

Your son,

CHAUNCEY