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William Harrison Proffit’s Letter Home From 1863

We’ve recently published a reprint of the Mary Alice Hancock book, Four Brothers in Gray. Ms. Hancock wrote her intriguing narrative of the Civil War using excerpts from the Proffit Family letters, now in the Southern Historical Collection of the Wilson Library at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Working with Wilkes Community College, who holds copyright to Ms. Hancock’s work, Imaging Specialists has added complete transcripts of over a hundred letters written by the boys and their “connection” (or extended family) home to Lewis Fork in Wilkes County.

Below is an excellent example of one of the letters written by William Harrison Proffit who volunteered to serve in the Army of Northern Virginia just a week after North Carolina seceded from the Union. Harrison Proffit was a school teacher and arguably the most eloquent of the four boys in describing his opinions of the war and his personal observations.

The correspondences, written throughout the conflict, from 1860 t0 1865, report the changing mood of the boys, from their initial optimism, the struggles of the war and the gloom of their inevitable fates.

 

Camp of the 1st N.C. Troops,
Near Port Royal, Va.,
Monday Morning, February 23d. 1863

Dear Father:

I write you another short letter to let you know that I am enjoying good health and getting along very well. Our Regiment has just performed another hard task of picket duty. We started from camp on Saturday evening and returned yesterday evening. On Saturday night and Sunday morning, we encountered the worst snow storm that has fallen this winter. Our Co. was stationed at a house near the bank of the River, therefore we fared tolerably well. The snow was about 12 inches deep.

We have comfortable quarters and are well supplied with clothing, blankets, &c. Our rations have been considerably reduced- we draw only half as much bacon as we did in the first part of the winter, but our wages have been raised $5.00 more per month, which make privates pay $16.00 per month. I have very little war news to write you at present. All operations on land are necessarily suspended on account of the inclemency of the weather.

I believe no attack is now expected in the vicinity of Fredericksburg; some think that most of the Yankees are leaving here. I should not be surprised if it were true. I suppose that Charleston, Savannah and Mobile, will be attacked bery soon. It is also very probable that another attack will be made on Vicksburg. I think if ithey are unsuccessful in these attempts, that active operations will cease, and our independence soon after acknowledged, but if the enemy should be successful, I have no doubt that it would tend grately to the prolongation of the war. Grate disaffection exists in the North Western States, and a North Western Confederacy is strongly spoken of. It is said that Gen’l Longstreet’s Corps of this army is going South. I think part of it has already gone. We belong to Jackson’s corps, therefore it is probable we will remain in Virginia.

I have not seen the other boys since I wrote you before, but heard from Andrew and Alfred a few days ago, they were well. I hope you received the letter I wrote you some time ago. I directed it to Lewis Fork P.O. Would it be more convenient for you to get letters from Lewis Fork? Write me as often as you conveniently can. Fearing that your letters are not backed correctly, I will send you an envelope properly directed.

My love to Mother and Sis, with all who may enquire for one.

Yours, as ever,
Wlm. H. Proffit

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Blue Ridge Music Trails at The Sparta Store

We’ve got a great new book in The Sparta Store –

Blue Ridge Music Trails of North Carolina.

The book is a detailed guide to traditional music venues in Western Carolina and includes a cd with 26 songs by North Carolina artists including the likes of Ola Belle Reed, The Watson Family, The Kruger Brothers,  Flatt & Scruggs and many others!

The 280-page  book/cd set is a project of the NC Arts Council published in association with the Blue Ridge National Heritage Area and was printed by UNC Press.

Read more about this exciting book at The Sparta Store.

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Four Brothers in Gray Available Now

The newest release from Star Route Books, Four Brothers in Gray, is now available! The book tells the story of Confederate soldiers Andy, Harrison, Calvin and Alfred Proffit. Star Route Books reprinted the book with permission from Wilkes Community College (who has copyrights to the 1975 work by Mary Alice Hancock.)


In it, Ms. Hancock tells about the Proffit family of Wilkes County, North Carolina, and the four sons of William and Mary Proffit that left home to fight for the South in the Great Rebellion. She uses the boys’ own words- excerpts taken from over 100 letters sent home to Lewis Fork by the boys and their cousins to trace their paths through the war.

Mary Alice Hancock began writing articles for magazines including the Saturday Evening Post, Sports Illustrated, American Legion Magazine, Progressive Farmer, Catholic Digest and VFW magazine. She wrote two fictional children’s books, Menace on the Mountain in 1968 which was eventually made into a two-part, television episode of The Wonderful World of Disney. Her second book, in 1969, was a non-fiction novel called Thundering Prairie about the Oklahoma Land Rush.

In addition to the narrative, transcriptions of 100+ of the brothers’ letters, which inspired Ms. Hancock, are included. Like other titles in the Star Route history series, Four Brothers in Gray includes contemporary photographs, drawings, illustrations and and period maps obtained from the National Archives, the Library of Congress, Virginia Military Institute, Harpers Pictorial History and many other resources.

Also included is family information, describing the relationships of the brothers, their cousins and in-laws, who are frequently mentioned in their letters. Their letters reveal the excitement of battle, the loneliness at the front, thoughts of home and their concern for family and nation.

The 320-page, black and white, softcover book, 7.44″ x 9.68″ (Crown Quarto size), is currently available at The Sparta Store in Sparta, N.C., and online at www.spartastore.com for $32, + tax and shipping. For more information on wholesale pricing, please contact Claire.

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15% Off Sale for ALL BANNERS

Start promoting your big summer event now! All banners are 15% Off from April 15-May 15.

We make beautiful, reusable, weather-proof vinyl banners for churches, corporations and civic groups. Bring your sketch and we’ll design your one-of-a-kind banner. Check out a few we’ve done in the past.

14 oz. vinyl banner material. Double metal grommets every 2 feet. Cut vinyl installed on white, black, red, blue, yellow or green banner. 22″, 34″ or 46″ high by whatever length you need! Contact us for pricing or call 336-372-3002.

Also ask about our rates for corrugated plastic yard signs.

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High Res Engraving of General Winfield Scott From Harper’s

We were recently lucky enough to purchase an original, unbound set of Harper’s Pictorial History of the Civil War by Alfred H. Guernsey and Henry M. Alden published by Star Publishing Co. in Chicago in 1866.

The books are filled with engravings of wartime photography and drawings that were made, mostly, while the war still raged. Much like today’s news, the articles were written during the conflict, so information was sometimes incorrect and wrong results may have been reported by those who were too close to the war.

Winfield Scott, scanned from a original 1866 copy of the set, Harper’s Pictorial History of the Civil War by Imaging Specialists.

While this immediacy might lead a reporter to draw the wrong conclusions, it is the very thing to make the photographer or the artist draw the correct ones- the closer the graphic artist is to the conflict, the clearer he can depict it and we can see it. People dedicated to the graphic arts have left us a very good lens with which to look back in time, insulated as we are from the conflict by time and the well-meaning commentary of generations of historians.

The images we are left with allow us to see, for ourselves, into the eyes of our ancestors, more clearly than any previous process and certainly further back in time than any others have been able to see. With the invention of photography, we are the first in history to see the clear face of someone born 200 years before us.

Consider the skill, the care and the time invested in these images, that have lasted a century and a half and were amazingly close to the subjects depicted.

But, as we sometimes like to think in terms of degrees of separation, consider: The engravings in these books were printed on paper (1) from from a craftsman’s engraved plates (2) that were made from a photographic print  (3) made from a glass negative (4) that recorded light bounced off a subject and through a lens. Or they were made from a drawing by an artist, presumably on site (3).

Mathew Brady’s photo of Winfield Scott was copied often by different artists. That the original is out of focus, probably accounts for minor differences in facial expression in each version.  So, even among skilled artists, there are variations.

William Hennessy’s work for the Harper’s image, above, makes the General look a little more grizzled and rough than the photograph he worked from (below). Other artists depict a softer expression.

Winfield Scott by Mathew Brady. Original at the United States Library of Congress.

Even photography isn’t immune to the artist’s sympathies. Contrast, levels, curves, sharpening, cropping etc. are all adjustable  and adjusted by everyone along the workflow from original to final printed piece or digital image, whatever the media.

Even if we ignore the idea of bias, two different shops can produce very different results. An internet search of any well known image will prove  that even in the IT age, opinions, agendas, sympathies and levels of ability affect results.

These books are perfect for our use since they came to us as they were originally sold- as unbound signatures, so we can easily scan them. (Original customers could have the 32-page signatures casebound after they collected the entire set.) The quality of the printing is excellent and they are folio sized at approximately 11.375″ x 16.375″.

Want a better look at the engraving of “Old Fuss and Feathers”? We’ve uploaded a much larger version of our scan to our server, here. (81MB jpg)

Creative Commons License
We’re happy to share this scan with a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License – you can use it in any project for any purpose. Please include attribution of “Scan courtesy Imaging Specialists, Inc., Sparta, NC.”