My respected,
Miss Nelie:

After a long delay I am writing to you again. I would have written much sooner, but the mail goes from here to Maysville only twice a week, & this I was unacquainted with until too late to send an early mail & I have therefore waited until now. Nothing new, however, has transpired during the vacancy worth your attention, more than our long talked of departure from Camp Lee.

It afforded me great pleasure to get away from Camp Lee, yet I cannot say why I was so very anxious to leave, for we had a good time while there & had good quarters, & I am happy to inform you that we have far better quarters here than we had at Camp Lee. We have quarters in a large brick house on Front Street, in the most important portion of the town, in the third story. The boys are all well except about three who are by no means dangerously afflicted, & they are all highly elated over the idea that pay day is only one week off.

When and where we will go from here remains yet to be seen, for our side has been so very prosperous lately that I can see no place where we are needed.

The grandest time I ever saw was the Sunday we left Maysville for this place. To describe the scene and do it justice would be impossible. When Capt. Wiley & I with several others returned to Camp from our wedding visit, we found all things in readiness to march, in fact the tents and all Quartermaster supplies had been taken to Maysville and were in waiting for the Steamer Boston. We all remained on the Magnolia the night we went up and therefore did not arrive at Camp until Saturday morning and on Sunday morning we were to take up our line of march for Maysville.

Accordingly on Sunday morning we were making ready to go, & at 9 o'clock we bade Camp Lee a farewell. Our long column of Soldiers reached near a quarter of a mile, we reach Maysville at about half past ten, where we found hundreds upon hundreds of people assembled to witness our movements, & our noble Colonel displayed us magnificently by marching us around the most important streets and finally down to the Boston which lay in waiting for us at the wharf, and when we all got on board the boat was crowded from deck to deck, one or two Companies were compelled to go out on top of the boat to find room, and some Companies were put in an old barge and towed by our boat, but our Company was so fortunate as to obtain a situation in the cabin, & I the most fortunate of all our boys found a State Room door unlocked, and I and Chris Lytle enjoyed ourselves by taking a nights rest in a birth while the others were passing the time away by sleeping on the Cabin floor. As we started out from the Maysville wharf, apparently thousands of handkerchiefs were waving and cheers greeted our parting, cannons roared and pistols cracked in all directions, steamboats were whistling and one generid noise made Sunday holy.

And on arriving at Manchester at the lower end of Manchester island cannons greeted us and we replied with long and loud cheers, suffice it to say that we had a "huge" time for Dick Nugent was most gloriously drunk.

I have been endeavoring to make this letter as short as possible, and include all on this sheet but I shall have to take another. I hope you will pardon me for writing so much nonsense, yet I love to receive a long letter & I never care about writing any other kind. (see next sheet)

Perhaps you have heard and if not I am proud to inform you that Nelson & I have gone into a written and solemn pledge to never drink a single drop of intoxicating drink while each are in the service, unless the physician prescribes it as a remedy.

As I said before, perhaps you have heard of the manner in which Nelson was conducting himself, if not I deem it necessary to confidentially inform you. Nelson is one of those who may be easily persuaded into any small evil, and some vile character in his Company taking advantage of this feature of his, persuaded him first into the bar room, & being unaccustomed to drinking, a very little makes him unable to pronounce himself a sober man, and thus by degrees and innocently on his part the appetite increased until it was almost ungovernable, this I saw and talked privately & seriously with him on the subject, but he heeded not and rather accused me of the same fait, of indulging in strong drink too much (this I will acknowledge to you to be the truth for I know you can pardon). I stopped touching a drop of whiskey & then requested him to also stop with me, and finauy he agreed to go into a pledge with me when we left Camp Lee, and be assured that I held him to that promise & when the morning for our starting arrived I presented him the written pledge with my name to it, and to my great satisfaction he placed his name with mine, & he declares most enthusiastically that he will keep it sacred, and you may bet that I will, and for your sake I shall employ my utmost endeavors to cause him to respect the same.

Asking pardon for writing so much and requesting you to write & give me an the news, I shall sign myself