Orsell's Letter To His Leaving Home Analysis

Orsell’s location during his leave of absence is not said in the letters, but it seemed he was still working within the army and was loving his time there. The happy and positive attitude seen in his first letters has returned as he writes to Olivia about how he was doing. “Oh! I am having a gay old time here with Baldwin and I’ll assure you I was treated like a white man” He was happily working his job in a safe location. He was getting the respect he deserved and this is truly a high point in his military career, but he was still stuck under military rule. “One thing I regret (but what’s the use) that is, that I am not to be a civilian this fall, that I might be earning my $75 per month for this same labor.” During this time all of Orsell’s letter contain the same message
that he is happy, healthy, and having the best possible experience he could. This comes to an end when he is sent back to the 44th New York and soon after he received the worst news yet, that he had been transferred from the 44th to the 140th New York. In his letter from September 25, 1864, Orsell was heartbroken. His friends are gone, the men he has seen the horrors of war with were leaving him alone. “The glorious 44th N.Y.I.R. left the Army of the Potomac yesterday morning and a sad, sad heart was a miss as I waved them a final adieu as they floated away from City Povit yesterday afternoon. You have seen my separation from the loved ones at home, but no less affecting was my leave taking of the few who were left of our noble laud, yet not as preparable. Dear Ollie they are gone, the associations of there long years has at last been broken.” He compared the feeling of him leaving home for the army to the feeling of watching his friends in the 44th sail away.
For a man who loved his family as much as Orsell, this is truly a statement to how close he was with those soldiers. “A noble record have they left behind them and may the deeds of honor and glory which crowns them follows them forever… For no number can ever be so dear to me as the 44th and if consolidated my hopes are blasted forever, but if filled up I shall look for brighter days.” Orsell loved those soldiers like family, like brothers. They were the people who gave him a reason to keep marching during those days when all he could was complain to Olivia in his letters. They are what caused him to reenlist back in February when he could have gone home to Olivia and the rest of his family in Ashville. The 44th New York had become his family though all the hardship, the fighting, and all the stuff Orsell grew to hate. This letter was a beautiful representation of how Orsell’s ideals about the war have changed from punishing the rebelling South to fighting for the sake of his soldier
family.