Alexandria, Louisiana May 8, 1864 My Dear and sweet Elizabeth: I am proud to inform you this nice morning that I recieved from under your hand of the 10th April one of the best letters I ever got in all my life. It appeared so loving and in such good spirits that I loved the very letter itself. It made me feel so good to read it that I have not got over it yet. There was something about it that seemed to cheer my heart. It seemed to me when I was reading it that I was with you then and realy when I got through I looked around to see if you was not there. Last night after Sam Richardson and me had fixt our palet ( for we sleep together now) we had shown and read several letters from home to the boys that was gone to the hospital and after Sam read several of them I took out yours and read such as I thought proper and he declared that it was the best letter he ever heard. It did not have that long tone to it and sighs and groans which some folks think would please a man and make him think that they love him so good that they can't live long but it had a familiar tone to it that sounded so lovely that I wish that I had a hundred such letters as that. You speak of the wheat and oats and grapes in the yard and the little pine sprints and your draft horses and the peach tree was dear to ¦¦¦ and lots of other things was in them lovely sheets. It was not the subject that made it so good as the manor in which it was spoke or declared and on last night as I dropped off to sleep, I thought that I loved you better than I ever did than in all my life if such a thing could be possible. You said that you had plenty to eat with the exception of bread but as I learned there is plenty of flower to sell in town at 3 dollars a hundred I shal expect you not to want even for bread. If you get the money that I sent you which I have no doubt that you will I never want my little children to want for bread while I am living tho I may be so far away from them. and I am not uneasy about it either as long as they have as good a mother as they have. I have thought that if you was to leave them that they do not look to me for protection but one thing I am proud to say and that is that I have never bin a disgrace to my family since I came in the Army and have always tride to conduct myself as near rite as I could. Tell little George that I am well and hearty and that I have not forgotten him yet and that I have a good horse to ride and have to ride a good deal and that he must be a good little boy and learn his book so he can read and write like me. Kiss the baby for me and tell George to kiss you for me and you let the baby kiss him. I am bout the same ala seven to 6 and it is no use to tell you that above all in this world I would love to see you the best and may God bless the hand that wrote that sweet letter and if I had been rite behind you when you was writing I should have stolen a kiss. I have had 3 nights rest now and I feel like another man. I had my hare trimmed close and washed all my clothes and last night I patched my drawers and britches. I have worn out my socks you sent me and throwed them away. I have tried to darn socks 3 times and it looks like something was the matter all the time. I am going to ask a favor of you and that is to do me up a nice pair of socks and send them to me by mail. It will only cost 12 cents to send them or anything that does not weigh over 2 pounds. If you was to send them to me I would thank you for them. There is a peas of a song that runs about as follows he's gone but only the Lord knows where perhaps ne never never will return perhaps he's taken shiping far away and left me in this wide worls alone. If he ever comes back to his dear girls arms his curly curly locks I'll unfold I never will chastise him for treating me so but admire him for being so bold. I think I would be more useful to you now than I was for I can wash and patch and cook too. I think I am a good cook in minutes and as long as I want the Army to stop for me to start fire and get coffee made and boil meat and I can eat as I go along. You must tell them fellas that did not come into the service that if they are hardcome for the necesarrys of life I can tell them how to do as I have bin in the the Army till I have learned how to take all advantages (for fear of hard times) keep all they've got and for a hungry stomach take a peace of meat and hang it up and jump up and swallow it and let it pull out and so on until the stomach becomes soft then swallow a piece of paper some soldier has sent home. Now I must close by saying to you to write me when you can and remember me Yours truly, M. A. Hooker to E. J. Hooker May 9, 1864 being unable to mail my letter to the office I can tell you that I am well and hardy today and we have marching orders to leave here we think that we are going to go to the Mississippi River someplace belo Natchez. I was on picket yesterday and me and the rebel pickets got along fine. We stood in site of each other and he did not shoot and neither did I. General Price is said to be in two days march of us and we have got as many rebels now as we can manage and I guess that is the reason of us going to leave. I stood to see one of our men run rite into the rebel lines yesterday and seen them capture him. I could have told him but I let him alone just to see them take him in. Patrick J. Anderson http://worldconnect.genealogy.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?db=patanderson 9654 Baltimore Avenue, Laurel, Maryland 20723