ENPages
p.
You need not send the Valise for two weeks as I shall not need it before expiration of that time. Send by Harnden's Express. If you will please prepay it will come cheaper - Direct as you would a letter.
I must close this. Love to all. Thomas & Jane will please accept my congratulations on their new relations - Kind regards to Horace & [Mary?]. Remember me to Timothy when you write him. I wrote Ann some days ago.
Trusting in the mercy of a just God, who overruleth all things for the best.
I remain
Your true Friend
Henry -
[page break]
Harewood Hospital Washington D.C. Jan. 13th 1863.
My Kind Friend -
Right glad am I that I am able to reply to your truly excellent letter. I shall not be able to write a long letter but gladly do I write what I can. I am getting along nicely so the Surgeons tell me. I hope to be nearly well in two weeks more. I suffer some from pain. My rest at night is quite broken. The bed is awful hard & I am getting sore in consequence. But I stand all this cheerfully - Knowing it will soon be over. Our nurses do all they can for me & the Surgeon is very kind.
p.
I am very much obliged to you for sending me that money. I will make it all right as soon as possible. Thomas need not be at the trouble of getting me U.S. Money as I have found a place where I could exchange it.
I do not regard my future prospects as at all gloomy. There is no profession in which I cannot do just as well as before. How many instances of amputated limbs I know where the persons adapt themselves to their business with remarkable facility. "What man has done, man may do." I do not despair. You never saw better courage than I have. The [Vt?] agent and his wife are very kind to me. They bring me many little comforts. They are very kind to us.
[page break]
How I wish I could be with Willie enjoying their nice winter quarters. It would be much preferable to being here. But my fighting days are over, unless I I fight like Santa Anna with a wooden leg. I shall be content hereafter to let others do the fighting.
I have now a favor to ask of you. I left my valise at Horace's. I wish to have it sent to me. In it there is a set of lasts. I wish Horace would get me a fine boot made on the left one. I gave the key to Horace at Brattleboro. You can send me that in a letter or inside the valise as I can get it open here some how. You may if you please put in a piece of cheese and such other little articles as you please. I shall need no clothing -
