Part 3 of the David Patrick Series
SERIES CONTEXT
This is Part 3 of a 4-part series exploring the life and legacy of David Patrick (1838–1864). This part is the closest we come to hearing his voice—in a letter written home during the war.
A Story That Found Me
I did not expect to hear his voice.
Up to this point, David Patrick had existed in records—census lines, enlistment dates, burial sites. The shape of a life could be traced, but the man himself remained just out of reach.
And then I found the letter.
It was written in October of 1863, in the middle of the Civil War. Folded into the archives of history, it carried something different than the documents I had been working with.
This was not a record.
This was David, writing home.
Where He Was When He Wrote It
This handwritten letter from David Patrick to his mother was written on October 25, 1863, while he was stationed in Little Rock, Arkansas.
By the time this letter was written, David had been in the army for months.
He had left behind the flat, open land of Ohio—the fields shaped by wind and work—and stepped into something far less certain. The rhythms of farming had been replaced by marching, waiting, and the constant presence of war.
We don’t always know exactly where he was on that day.
But we know enough.
He was a young man, far from home, writing to his mother—
trying, in whatever way he could, to stay connected to the life he had left behind.
Transcription (Page 1):
Little Rock, Ark
Oct 25th 1863
My Dear Mother
I once more seat myself to send you a few lines in answer to yours which I received day before yesterday, which I was glad to get from you and to here you was well.
We are now at Little Rock Ark building cabins to live in. My company has two nearly finished now and timber enough for the rest, but it is rather chilly here today and my tent has no fire in it.
Will stop to warm my fingers as I have just written one letter to…
A Voice Across Time
After reading his words, I had to sit with them.
He writes about cabins, cold weather, and letters from home. There is nothing dramatic here—just the rhythm of daily life.
But across time, even these simple words feel like a bridge, connecting his world to ours.
Transcription (Page 2):
Levi so my fingers is cold
Well Mother I have warmed my fingers and eat my dinner so I will try and finish my letter to you.
We have cold nights here and warm pleasant days.
Some cold rains so cold that it gives me a bad cold when I am on picket guard and it rains all night as it did the last time I was on guard.
I got a letter from you day before yesterday and one from Laura Timmons, one from Frank Hull.
He is well but is sick in the Hospital and from Mary. She has been having the chill…
What We Can Hear in This
He is not alone in this letter.
Even from a distance, his world is filled with names—family, neighbors, familiar lives that continue alongside his own.
He writes of money, of pay, of what he is earning.
But beneath it, there is something harder to measure—the cost of being away from the life he would rather be living.
Transcription (Page 3):
She does not have very good health. The little children are both well and hearty. They live now in Warren Co Iowa. There folks live in Hartford.
I got 26 dollars more pay day before yesterday and they say we will get two months more pay in three or four weeks.
The government pays the soldiers first rate lately so we can all have plenty of money but it is not a very pleasant way to make money and not as fast as I could make it if I was now at home but it is enough for the soldiers to get from the government.
In His Own Words
He writes about money, about pay, about what he is earning.
But beneath it, there is something harder to measure—the cost of being away from the life he would rather be living.
Transcription (Page 4):
But I hope the war will soon be over and I am as well as cannot wright now.
Soon and often I like to get letters when I am in the army.
Good by,
David Patrick
to his Mother(spelling preserved from original)
What He Chose to Share
He writes of his health, of the hope that the war might end, and of wanting letters from home.
They are simple words, but across time they carry the weight of distance, uncertainty, and the quiet need to stay connected.
Reading Between the Lines
His words are simple.
Practical.
Grounded in the everyday realities of a soldier’s life—conditions, movement, small details that reassure more than they reveal.
There is no dramatic language. No declaration of fear. No grand reflection on war.
And yet, it is all there.
Between the lines, you can feel what is not being said.
A son writing carefully, perhaps deliberately, so as not to worry his mother.
A man adjusting to a world that no longer resembles the one he came from.
A voice that carries distance—both physical and emotional.
A Voice That Carries Forward
This letter survived.
Across time, across generations, across all the ways things are lost.
And because it survived, his voice did too.
Not loudly.
Not dramatically.
But clearly enough that, all these years later, I can read his words and feel something real and immediate.
For a moment, the distance closes.
What Remains
We hear him.
Not through records.
Not through interpretation.
But in his own words—
written in a moment he could not have known would be preserved.
Legacy
This letter changes everything.
It turns a name into a voice, a record into a person.
And once heard, that voice carries forward—into memory, into story, and into the generations that follow.
Research and Records
This narrative is based on a combination of historical records and family research, including:
- United States Federal Census (1850, 1860)
- Iowa State Census records
- Civil War military records (40th Iowa Infantry)
- Pension index and service records
- Newspaper accounts and regimental reports
- The David Patrick Civil War letter (1863)
- Genealogical research and compiled family records
View full source list: David Palmer Patrick — Research and Sources
Notes on Sources
This narrative is based on a preserved handwritten letter from David Patrick, along with family research and Civil War context. Transcription reflects original spelling and structure.
SERIES NAVIGATION
Continue the Story
← Part 2: The Decision — A Farmer, A Soldier, A Choice That Changed Everything
→ Part 4: The Final Days
Full Series:
- Part 1: The Land That Shaped Him
- Part 2: The Decision
- Part 3: I Can Hear Your Voice — A Letter Home
- Part 4: The Final Days
Citation: David Patrick Civil War Letter to his mother, 29 October 1863, MSS.13-.14, Butler Center for Arkansas Studies, Arkansas Studies Institute, Little Rock, AR.
2 Comments
That’s a gem indeed. How we will miss all these heartfelt and handwritten treasures now we use ephemeral emails all the time.
I am surprised the writing is so legible. I can really hear his voice and it looks like by the end his fingers were getting cold again!
Like most war letters it’s all very poignant, especially the goodbye. I wonder, did he survive the war?
Best wishes…
I believe we certainly will miss them. David didn’t survive the war. He was wounded in the battle at Jenkins Ferry, left behind in the rain and mud, taken to an “Enemy Hospital” and died of gangrene of wounds six months later. He left for war before my great great grandfather was born.