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Camden S.C. Nov 13th 1865
My very dear young Friends
Feeling no ordinary degree of
attachment for you as the chosen Friend of my noble Son I
cannot feel that these lines will be unwelcome, I would
thank your dear kind family for their attentions to
him, but oh! how feebly words express the feelings of the
heart, months & even years you helped him to pass time
that otherways would have dragged wearily, sadly on,
for he partook not of the amusements of camp life, found
little companionship there, being piously raised to ever
prefering the society of intelligent ladies to that of men.
In the bosom of your kind family he found a little
paradise, finding your dear Mother pious his heart
went out to her, Miss Virginia was captivating, but he
had not words to express the idea he wished to give his
Mother of Miss Bettie, she was his beau ideal of a perfect
woman & he would say "dear Ma when the war is
over I shall not be able to stay away from Va" dear
child 'tis even so, but not in the way he meant, he lies
nearer you than me, alone, alone, oh! that lone
grave by the road side, how it stands before me day
& night & my heart is in it, I too am passing away.