Fredericksburg, Va. December 13, 1862

At the bottom of this hill, which overlooks 
the town, lie thousands and thousands of dead 
and dying Yankees.  They attacked us again 
and again and again today, and not one of 
them reached our lines. The brigades of our
Generals Kershaw and Cobb slaughtered them all 
the live long day.

Over on General Jackson's front, the Yankees 
made better progress, but were then finally 
pushed back. Here, on General Longstreet's 
portion of the battlefield, the enemy soldiers 
were simply destroyed, shot down like figures
in a shooting gallery.

One moment in the afternoon General Lee 
cautioned General Longstreet that the Yankees 
might eventually break our lines. Longstreet 
replied to General Lee: "Sir, as long as my 
people are down there with ammunition, when
the Yankees come, I will kill them all."

About that time I heard one of our artillery 
officers assure the generals that a chicken 
could not live on that field when our cannons 
open fire on it.

The Yankees have all but destroyed the town.  
It is night, now, and I can see the fires 
burning in the homes and businesses, through 
the roofs, and through the holes that the 
cannon shots have made.  The people have mostly
fled.

After Lincoln removed General McClellan when he 
failed to catch us after Sharpsburg, we wondered 
what the new Yankee commander, General Burnside 
(the man with the big whiskers) would do. Today, 
he simply fed his men into eternity.

Though General Cobb went down and has since died 
(and I understand that General Gregg of Jackson's 
Corps is also gone), we have suffered little in
comparison to those poor men, dead and dying, on 
the ground in front of us.

From where I sit writing, I can see some of our 
men moving around among the fallen Yankees.  I pray 
to God that some are trying to help the wounded
Union soldiers, as well as taking things from the 
bodies of those poor souls who no longer need them. 

It is very cold.