University of Virginia Library

This letter is dated two days before the 38th Regiment was ordered to the front at Gettysburg (Gregory, 37).

The author used a pen flourish which resembles a half-parenthesis to indicate that the date, which he has placed on the same line as the salutation of the letter, is separate from it. He also used a flourish next to the salutation to separate it from the date. Refer to the image of this page for clarification.

According to the OED, "inst." is an abbreviation for "instant," which refers to the current calendar month e.g. the 10th instant is the tenth day of the current month.