Seven letter grouping, addressed to James & (sister) Mary Young, Brewer/ Maine. Letters range in date and locale from Camp Seward, VA., 6/20/1861 to Georgetown Union Hospital, 3/26/1862. Five of them 4pp. in length, one [Aug. 29] six pages, all in ink. All exhibit light fading here and there, while  remaining entirely legible.

A resident of Brewer, ME, 22 year-old Melvin Nickerson was mustered in as a Private in Co. “C”, 2^nd Maine Infantry, 5/28/ 1861. At  that  time 2^nd Maine recruits had the option of enlisting for two or  three years, though it was unclear to many which they had signed up for, Melville Nickerson included. He is listed as having received promotion to corporal and sergeant, undated, and as having been discharged for disability, also undated.

The 2^nd Maine was engaged at the First Battle of Bull run, and, attached to the Union 3^rd Corps, was  during the McClellan’s 1862 Peninsula Campaign, and at the Battles of Antietam and Fredericksburg, and later at Chancellorsville, at which point the two year enlistees were mustered out and the three year men assigned to the  20^th Maine. During its two year service the unit lost 69 killed and mortally wounded and 70 by disease for a total of 139.

It is assumed that Nickerson was discharged for disability at some point prior to the mustering out of the two year men following Chancellorsville. Three letters are dated in latter June, a month the prior to the 1^st Bull run, followed by one in late August, one in December, and the concluding letter from the Georgetown Hospital.

A sharp observer and enterprising articulate young man, Nickerson’s  first three letters provide good camp detail, as well as speculation to what is ahead, as both forces begin troop movements that will culminate in the Battle of Bull Run. As follows:

June 20^th—“…federal troops are slowly but surely advancing their lines towards Harper’s Ferry and Manassas Gap and probably there will be a pitched fight there before long if there is any fight in the south but every moment it is delayed finds in better shape forward as we are improving in drill and there are troops arriving every day…but it is felt that the war will not be prosecuted very much until Congress meets and then after they [the South] have a chance to throw down their arms…[If they don’t]…then Jeff Davis & Co. had better look out for their necks are in danger…

June 26—"…After we got through [Dress Parade]…the band of the 3^rd reg. came over and played in front of our officers for about an hour they have a very fine band of 23 pieces. We had a splendid serenade. The officers encourage the boys to get up all kinds of sports. It serves to make our time pass more pleasantly and keep the boys from being homesick…

Monday afternoon I went out on a cruise in the country back of here. I went about three or four miles back on the plantation and had a first rate time and some of them looked awful ugly but they do not dare say anything here about secession to our soldier for an insult offer to one of them and they would tear a man’s hour down over it ears. So we cruise around and eat all of their strawberries and other fruit that we can find on their plantation and thank nobody for it…

June 27—“…I am tanned so black that I am almost afraid to go out among the slaveholders around here, and have got a ferocious mustache and whiskers almost as heavy as the President—at least I shall have in a few weeks…

…We have about as many men as this city [Washington DC] will hold and the rooms are all full round about here probably we have from one hundred to one hundred thousand men here…and about 250 thousand  under arms in the north and by September we shall have 500 thousand and they would make short work of the south…

“”there is a daguerrian  artist here by the name of Mrs. Donaldson a widow lady who is taking pictures for 25 cents when I get paid off I shall send my picture home I except it will be splendiferous. Georgeously magnificent…

August 29--[At Fort Corcoran] Following the Battle of Bull Run—“…We are learning how to handle the big gun now…{8 inch howitzer)…I am a gunner of one of the pieces she is a beauty I tell you she weighs 5, 780 pounds and I am going to fetch home with me for a fowling piece…

“We had a grand review of this Brigade last Tuesday by Gen. McClellan & Staff and the President & Secretary Seward. They came into the fort and saw us exercise on the guns. And like all the others they gave a very good name but did not seem to think much of our good cloths and to tell the truth I never aw the regiment look so quite so bad…There is an order to do away with all the Grey uniforms, so I think we shall get new ones soon…

If I don’t come home til I play sick to get a discharge it won’t be right away for I hate to be called a coward. I don’t mean to call any of the returned from the “Bloody” Second so by any means but it looks queer at any rate.

The new from Missouri has caused a general sorrow everywhere [at the Union loss at the Battle of Wilson’s Creek, Aug. 10, 1861]. We  have lost in Gen. Lyon one of the best & bravest General in the service.

November 26—[At Hall’s Hill, VA]—“There has been nothing here of interest…except the great review that came of last Wednesday about three miles below here…there was about 60 thousand men there and it was the greatest military show ever witnessed on this continent…

Uncle Abram was there on horseback by the side of Gen. McClellan or George as the boys call him, and as they passed down the line each regiment gave three cheers and Gen. McClellan blushed red as a beet but old Abe merely took his hat off and rode on as cool as a cucumber. He has been in so many crowds this past year that he has got used to them whilst our young General is not much used such thing yet. He has great responsibility on his shoulders and I hope he come out alright…”

“Oh I should like to go to South Carolina and help wipe her out enterely and make government land of her again. I would fight for that as I never fought before but Virginia & Tennessee &Kentucky I pity for they have been forced out of the Union and into this business whilst the more southern states where this business was first hatched have thus far escaped with only damage their pockets, but now at their main doors the enemy  in thundering and they are likely to reap the fruit of their own folly. But I have moralized on this subject long enough…”

December 1, 1861—” Everything is quite in this sector…and will remain so…for the roads are so muddy…and it will be impossible to move until they become settled in Spring…and then our immense naval force shall occupy every important Port and City of the southern Sea Coast—this winter with one grand sweep of this grand armee George will wipe out the bubbles that Jeff Davis is pleased to call secession from the face of the earth…

You can give my heartiest congratulation to Herman a& Julia [on the birth of a baby]…and tell them that Melvina would be a proper nice name the illustrious stranger…and I really don’t know [of a better name than that] of her soldier uncle [which is to say himself, Melville]…any other name will do as I am not particular at all…and “a rose called by  any other name would smell so sweet.”

March 26, 1861, Georgetown Union Hospital—"Since I wrote last week I have had but little of the chills for a week past and the doctor thinks that he has broken them up entirely and I hop so too for I don’t like them half as well as I do bread and butter.

You write that you have been looking for me home for several nights past , well keep on looking for I think I shall get them May 1 if nothing happens and not much before.

It is a very easy thing to be ordered a discharge and is an easy thing to talk about but it is an entirely different thing to get it and to show you some thing about the process I will tell you all about it. First the Surgeon orders a discharge and furnishes the blanks and the Capt. Fills the description part of them and sends them to the surgeon again and he sends them to the Surgeon General’s office for approval then they are sent back to the Surgeon who first orders them and he putts in his certificate of disability which he and the Capt. has to sign. Then that finishes that that part of the business.

Next the man must have a set of papers stating by whom he was enlisted and by whom he was mustered into service. Also a statement of pay & clothing he has received from the government and from whom & what officer he received it also at what time he rec’d it and after that is approval and signed by the captain of the company to which he belongs and also by the commanding officer of the regiment if he is with the regiment—if not by the officer in command of the fort where he is. He may consider himself fairly discharged. So that you can that it must take some time to get discharged even after the order is given. If a man gets his papers all through in three month, after they commenced he does well.

My present quarters…they are in a fire building in the city of Georgetown which you know joins Washington and is only a mile from the White House and about a mile further to the Capitol. And as I am not very sick and am good chums with the doctor in charge I have liberty of cruise around as much as I like and I think of going to Congress a half a day tomorrow…I hop you won’t worry about my getting low and dissipated by going to such places for I shall be on my guard I tell you. Although I hate to associate with such characters as congressmen and shall no do so more than possible.”

A highly interesting and entertaining set of letters from a very sharp young soldier of the 2^nd Maine, a kid quite capable of looking out for himself and arranging a discharge for disability, which he eventually did, though exactly when and where the records don’t say. Invites further research. In protective sleeves.  [JP] [PH:L]

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