1861 50th Illinois Infantry ALS -- ''...I was riding in an old freight car...crowded...we had our stove set up...and kept on a good fire or else we would have nearly froze...''
4pp. letter from George W. Stauffer of the 50th Illinois Infantry, Company D, to his brother. Datelined ''St. Joseph Mo. Dec. 23rd /61,'' letter reads in part: ''...We have been down to Palmyra started on the 19th of December about three o'clock in the morning got there about three o'clock in the afternoon, stayed till...the 22nd, slept in cars...We are now in St. Joe in a...large hall in the third story of a brick building but how long we will stay here nobody knows. The word is we are to stay here six weeks then go down the Mississippi on the gun boats but we don't know whether this is so or not...it is not very hard to tell where I was on Sunday. I was riding in an old freight car and crowded like everything, we had our stove set up in it and kept on a good fire or else we would have nearly froze. It commenced snowing Saturday in the afternoon and snowed all day Sunday and the snow is on an average, I guess, six inches deep...'' Stauffer mustered into Company D on September 1861 and, after participating in the Grand Review, was discharged as a Corporal in July 1865. The 50th Illinois Infantry saw action at Fort Donelson and Shiloh as well as in Sherman's March to the Sea. Ink letter measures 5'' x 8''. Some soiling, otherwise excellent condition.
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1861 50th Illinois Infantry ALS -- ''...I was riding in an old freight car...crowded...we had our stove set up...and kept on a good fire or else we would have nearly froze...''
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