University of Virginia Library

Letter from Charles Berry Senior to his Father, September 9, 1864

It is some
time since I wrote but I have not
yet received any answer to my last letter
I should have wrote before but we couldnt
send away any mail & I was waiting for
the taking of Atlanta I still continue to
have the best of health & hope that you may
be all well I have passed safely through this
campaign for I suppose it is through now
as we have been down 10 miles below Janesboro
& have come back & taken our camp hero 6
miles from Atlanta You will see from the
papers the splendid movement of Gen Sherman
by which he so completely bamboosled the
rebs out of their stronghold cut their communica tion>
& compelled them instead of their burying the
yankee army here as they boasted as they intende
to do to evacuate the town & make the best
of their way southward The whole 16th corps
worked on the Montgomery road for one day quiet
faithful the 7th Iowa had a fine time

destroying that road out to Fairburn,
18 miles fron Atlanta. It was the first days
work that I ever did on the railway & I liked it first rate. In the morning we went
out without knapsacks almost on the doublequick
for 8 or 9 miles to the town where we went
to work, and then went back at night.
Next day, the 2nd, 7th Iowa was ordered
to report to Kilpatrick to go with the
cavalry as a support We did, and started
out with them when about noon we run
into some of the Johnnys. We captured a
negro that escaped from them & he said
there were 1600 of them. They had a rail bar
ricade in a large cornfield We fired a few
shots with the 10 lb. Rodmans belonging
to the cavalry, when the 2nd Iowa which
was in advance, immediately formed &
charged with a yell up to the barricade &
took it, the rebs flying like the wind,
the 7th about 40 rods behind as a support. The
2nd lost a number of men but I never
knew how many.

In the afternoon we joined the rest of ours
and the 15th Corps which came in on another
road, Then came the battle on the 31st
when the rebels got so awfully flaxed
old Hood butting his brains out again upon
our works. Hardees Corps coming again
in front of the 16th which has whipped
them 3 times now There was over 44 deserters
came in right in front of our regiment, or not
exactly deserters but men that in charging
across a field got into a ditch & did
not retreat back with their comrades.
Now all the soldiers want is to have Old
Abe for our next president & this thing
will soon come to a successful end but
if the copperheads elect McClellan or
Freemont there will be direful consequences
I am afraid. If we get 500,000 more
men the rebels can be swept from the face
of the earth anyhow before the end of
Lincoln's Administration & I think
that it will be done. Sherman has done
his work well. I hope that Grant

yet accomplish his object take
burg & Richmond & we get Mobile
A. J. Smith clean out Mississippi and Alabama
get our communication open from the
gulf, & the rebellion is then played
out, which I hope to God it
may for this thing has been going
on long enough. The report is here
that we are going to camp for a month
& prepare for a vigorous winter
campaign.