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 211 Notes Preface 1. Matt Hauger is William McKnight’s great-great-great-grandson. 2. Ruth Hayth is William McKnight’s great-great-granddaughter. Acknowledgments 1. Susan Hayes and Mary Johnston are both William McKnight’s greatgreat -granddaughters, and Lois Mohler is a great-great-great-granddaughter to McKnight. Introduction 1. Historian Chandra Manning in What This Cruel War Was Over (2007, 9) contends , “Civil War soldiers’ letters and diaries offer unparalleled insight into the thoughts of ordinary Americans during a defining time in the nation’s history.” 2. Linderman 1987, 94. “Letters from home have been [of] crucial importance in sustaining morale in all literate armies” (McPherson 1997, 133). 3. Carroll 2001, 22; Woodworth 1996, 60. 4. Linderman 1987, 94. 5. Woodworth 1996, 60. 6. Gallagher et al. 2003, 149. 7. Linderman 1987, 7. 8. War letters “passed between those on the front lines and the loved ones back home have often provided the clearest views of armed conflict. Whether scribbled in a foxhole or composed at a kitchen counter, each serves as a reminder of the mark war leaves on every human swept into its path” (Carroll 2005, 78). 9. Early in the war, McKnight’s letters were written on quality stationery and stamped with Union emblems. As the war continued, paper became scarce, as evidenced by the fact that McKnight often wrote on all the available space. On one occasion, McKnight wrote to Samaria on the back of orders he received from Captain Santmyer. Another letter was written on a sheet from an East Tennessee and Virginia Railroad ledger book. You are reading copyrighted material published by Ohio University Press/Swallow Press. Unauthorized posting, copying, or distributing of this work except as permitted under U.S. copyright law is illegal and injures the author and publisher. notes to pages 3–5  212 10. Civil War letters, including McKnight’s, were not censored; as a result, they are “extraordinarily candid and revealing about every facet of a soldier’s life, from his opinion of officers and of political leaders to the boredom of life in the winter quarters and the terror of battle” (Burgess 1995, xi). 11. In addition to the letters, the McKnight collection contains three diaries written between 1863 and 1864. While the letters are in good condition, the diaries, which are in Ruth Hayth’s possession, are not in good condition, and large portions are illegible. 12. William McKnight to Samaria McKnight, November 18, 1862. 13. William McKnight to Samaria McKnight, November 26, 1862. 14. William McKnight to Samaria McKnight, June 5, 1864. 15. Carroll 2005, 84. 16. William McKnight to Samaria McKnight, January 9, 1863. 17. William McKnight to Samaria McKnight, January 12, 1863. 18. Thomas McKnight to William McKnight, 1864. 19. Some soldiers were “motivated by a sense of duty and honor bound together in their understanding of manhood. Many volunteered for ideological reasons, leaving their homes to defend the Union, liberty, and their revolutionary inheritance” (Dee 2006, 94). 20. William McKnight to Samaria McKnight, November 14, 1862; William McKnight to Samaria McKnight, December 15, 1862. 21. William McKnight to Samaria McKnight, March 24, 1863. 22. William McKnight to Samaria McKnight, March 9, 1864. 23. “After the war, federal officials estimated that more than eighteen thousand Ohio soldiers deserted from the army—a figure that seems to underestimate the actual number of deserters” (Dee 2006, 129). Desertions from the Ohio army “averaged 44 men to each thousand, much lower than in some other states, Connecticut, for example, where the rate of desertion was 117 per thousand” (Harper 1961b, 10). 24. William McKnight to Samaria McKnight, January 24, 1863. 25. William McKnight to Samaria McKnight, March 24, 1863. 26. Linderman 1987, 102. Ohio troops “infused a religious zeal into the contest. They held their soldiers to be soldiers in a holy war; they truly believed that through battle, and siege, and reverse, God was waiting, in His own time, to give them the victory” (Reid 1895a, 15). Northern soldiers may have become more religious during the war (Sheehan-Dean 2007). 27. William McKnight to Samaria McKnight, May 2, 1863. 28. William McKnight to Samaria McKnight, May 4, 1863. 29. William McKnight to Samaria McKnight, May 7, 1863; William McKnight to Samaria McKnight, June 2, 1863. You are reading copyrighted material published by Ohio University Press/Swallow Press. Unauthorized posting, copying, or distributing of this work except as permitted under U.S. copyright law is illegal and injures the author and publisher. [18.220.154...

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