Things have pretty much settled down now.  Sid 
is beginning to come to me. I spend a lot of 
time playing with him.  Elizabeth and I are 
getting comfortable being together.  She has 
done a wonderful job with the farm. She's done 
most of the planting and harvesting with a 
little help from some of the church elders.  
She's not alone.  Most of the women-folks 
hear-abouts have had to manage without their 
men.  I went to see Mrs. Prusser today. She's 
doing alright, but like everyone she is just 
getting by.  I talked with her for a couple of 
hours and then we went to visit the Captain's 
grave behind the house.  I guess I really 
wanted to say my final words to him also.  She 
left me there for a few minutes to be alone and 
say my farewells. After visiting with her a 
while longer, I went into town.

Navasota hasn't changed too much.  All of the 
males left are mostly young-uns or old men.  
Most of the men have left to fight in the war, 
and are either still gone or dead.  A lot of 
the men who were boys when I left are now 
serving also. Everyone wanted to know about the 
war.  I told them I hadn't seen much of the war 
for better than half a year, but told them what 
I knew.  Of course, they wanted to talk about 
the fighting.  I don't care to remember those 
times, but talked to them of the men I'd known 
and the good times.  

I've seen a couple of veterans that were also 
wounded.  Sam Russell was withanother unit on 
Missionary Ridge while I was at Lookout Mt.  He 
was in the artillery and lost an arm in the 
battle.  Like me, he doesn't like to talk about 
the fighting to civilians, but we talked a bit 
about it.  I told him about the Mountain, and he 
told me of the desperate fighting on the Ridge.

He said that at one time they couldn't depress 
their guns enough and wound up fusing cannon 
balls, lighting them and rolling down on the 
Yanks.  Toward the end, they spiked their cannon 
and rolled them down also.  he was wounded
while pullng back. Says it was ironic that it was 
a cannon ball that took off his arm while he was 
helping set up another artillery position.  

Bob Jewell is also here.  He was shot in the face 
and is blind.  He's pretty bitter, and does not 
want to talk to anyone much right now.  Jed 
Taylor is another veteran.  He was with Lee in 
Gettysburg.  At least that's what his family 
told me.  Jed has something wrong in his head 
and is crazy as a peach orchard boar.  He talks 
to himself most of the time.  When he talks to
others, he doesn't make much sense at all.

Compared to these men, I guess I'm really lucky.  
I lost a big chunk of my backsides and limp a 
little, but I'm still pretty much whole.  I have 
a family and a farm, and the war hasn't touched 
around here.  God's been good to me.