{"id":101249,"date":"2025-04-01T02:58:24","date_gmt":"2025-04-01T07:58:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cw-chronicles.com\/blog\/?p=101249"},"modified":"2021-04-16T11:26:08","modified_gmt":"2021-04-16T16:26:08","slug":"civil-war-letters-of-walter-and-george-battle-52","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.cw-chronicles.com\/blog\/civil-war-letters-of-walter-and-george-battle-52\/","title":{"rendered":"Civil War Letters of Walter and George Lee"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\" \"\"Alas, these letters are all that is left of the two noble sons and brothers, for George (right) was killed at the battle of “Seven Pines” while Walter (left) died from exposure after that terrible battle he so vividly describes in one of his letters.1, 2<\/strong><\/sup><\/span> “Requiescat in pace<\/em><\/i>” to all who fell in those days in that cruel war.<\/p>\n

“All quiet along the Potomac,” they say,
\nExcept now and then a stray picket
\nIs shot as he walks on his beat, to and fro,
\nBy a rifleman hid in the thicket;
\n‘Tis nothing, a private or two, now and then,
\nWill not count in the news of the battle,
\nNot as officers lost – only one of the men
\nMoaning out, all alone the death rattle.”<\/p>\n

– ETHEL LYNN BEERS<\/p>\n

“What are we set on earth for? Say, to toil –
\nNor seek to leave thy tending of the vines,
\nFor all the heat o’ the day, till it declines,
\nAnd Death’s mild curfew shall from work assoil.
\nGod did anoint thee with His odorous oil,
\nTo wrestle, not to reign; and He assigns
\nAll thy tears over, like pure crystallines,
\nFor younger fellow-workers of the soil
\nTo wear for amulets. So others shall
\nTake patience, labor, to their heart and hand,
\nFrom thy hand and thy heart, and thy brave cheer,
\nAnd God’s grace fructify through thee to all.
\nThe least flower with a brimming cup, may stand
\nAnd share its dew-drop with another near.”<\/p>\n

– ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING.<\/p>\n

\n

Letters from two brothers who served in the 4th North Carolina Infantry during the Civil War are available in a number of sources online.\u00a0 Unfortunately, the brothers are misidentified in some places as Walter Lee<\/strong> and George<\/strong> Lee<\/strong> when their names were actually Walter<\/strong> Battle<\/strong> and George Battle<\/strong>. See The Battle Brothers<\/a> for more information on the misidentification.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. \"\"The death of Walter Raleigh Battle from exposure after a battle is a fiction created by Laura Elizabeth Lee Battle in her book, Forget-me-nots of the Civil War: A romance, containing reminiscences and original letters of two Confederate Soldiers<\/i>. Walter actually died a month before his 30th birthday in Wilson County, North Carolina.\u00a0 Laura Battle essentially plagiarized the letters of her brothers-in-law by identifying them as her half-brothers. See The Battle Brothers<\/a> for more information on\u00a0 Laura Elizabeth Lee Battle misappropriation of the two soldiers for her book.<\/li>\n
  2. Editor Sharlene Baker fails to correct the fiction in As you may never see us again: The Civil War Letters of George and Walter Battle<\/i> on page 95 where she included all but the Browning poem (above, in the body of post) from Laura Battle’s book.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Alas, these letters are all that is left of the two noble sons and brothers, for George (right) was killed at the battle of “Seven Pines” while Walter (left) died from exposure after that terrible battle he so vividly describes in one of his letters.1, 2 “Requiescat in pace” to all who fell in those […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[146],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-101249","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-civil-war-letters-of-walter-and-george-battle"},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.cw-chronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101249","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.cw-chronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.cw-chronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.cw-chronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/21"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.cw-chronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101249"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.cw-chronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101249\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.cw-chronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.cw-chronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101249"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.cw-chronicles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}