Punished For Being Caught! (Bucked)

This letter is the first one of quite a few that this former Yankee POW sent my family. He mistakenly addressed it to my great grandfather, Private John Pelopidus Leach instead of my great uncle, 1st Lt. George Thomas Leach. (He was in charge of the sharpshooters on the retreat from to Appomattox) My great uncle had already died, so my great grandfather took up the correspondence with him. Both my relatives were detailed guarding prisoners for a while. This prisoner made a pipe for my great, great grandfather, but it has been lost.

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tjustus@sprynet.com

Mr Townsend— My great-grandfather is David Hardy Sanders (1843-73), Company C, 53rd Regiment, NC State Troops.

He enlisted 16th May 1862, was captured 2nd April 1865, POW held at Point Lookout Md, Released and Oath of Allegiance 20th June 1865. He was from Johnston County and returned there after the war. I own a housewife that he carried. My father has a fiddle, but I think that is something he acquired post-war. Info from my cousin says that he had brown hair and grey eyes, and was 6’1/2” (pretty tall for those days).

Regards, Tracy Sanders Justus

From Free North Carolina