Houghton Civil War Letters

Fort Heckman Morehead Citty [NC. Oct 25 1861] Mr Warren Dear friend I recieved your kind letter with a dollars worth of postage [stamps] sometime ago, and ought to have answered it before but I have kept doing one thing or another until now I am in good health yet and I have not been excuse from duty a day or an hour on acount of sickness since I enlisted my company has been changed around considerably since we have been here but we have not failed in receiving all our letters a [net] if the people at home could see the disapointed

of those who do not receive the expected letter or the happy one of those who do they would not fail to answer imediately all the letters they receive, as far as I am concern I can find no fault with any of my corospondents.

Fort Heckman the place where Co. "C" are now is about 5 miles from For Macon and a far more Healthyier place I like it better there is more excitement once in here the rumor that the "Rebs" are within one or two miles if nothing more then we are not so confined at Macon as soon as the evening gun was fired were just as

much prisoners as if we were inmates of that large stone building in Charlestown muss set apart for those who are acquiring to much notoriety for the public good but here we have nearly as much freedom as at home the Fort is not quite finished and only mounts three guns at present but will [illegible] two more within a month it is a pretty little fort too pretty for such a place like this.

There are not so many negroes here as at Newbern but are a better class as far as intelligence is concerned although none of them are so intelligent as our northern blacks as for that matter the whites themselfs are not bright

as the people up in Old Mass all classes here indulge in the disgusting habit of chewing snuff (poor whites and they are nearly all as poor as job's turkey if not a little more so) Negroes and the better class of whites one of our soldiers was up at Newbern a few days ago and he saw and remarked to a companion a very fine looking young lady he hardly got the words out of his mouth before she spit out an amount of snuf sufficient for a good handfull and from what I have seen myself I don't think he strecth it a great deal its effect on the persons that use

it especialy the women you will see them not more than thirty five or forty years old looking like old ladies of seventy or eighty with the exception of not having grey hair. Education here is almost unknown excep by the wealthier class. I have seen as intelligent looking men as you see any where but whn you go to talk with they will betray their ignorance of the most trifling things and by handing them a paper they will tell you they cannot read I am told by old soldiers that they are not so ignorant here as in Virginia but I do not wish to see a state any more so than this.