Last Letter Home from Warren B. Persons Andersonville Prison, Georgia - July 2, 1864

Last Letter Home from Warren B. Persons Andersonville Prison, Georgia - July 2, 1864

Confederate Hospital near
Andersonville Ga  July 2/64

Dear Friends at Home:-

It is just one year since I was captured and I have taken the best care I could of myself, and struggled long and hard for life, for my sake and for the sake of loved ones at home, but it is of no use. I discover I lose strength daily, and the feeble beating of my pulse warns me that what little remains for me to do must be done quickly. I have no particular disease, except general disability, and I shall probably die an easy death. My principle reason for writing this to you is to let you know that I die in hope of a blessed immortality beyond the grave, and I can truly say, "O Grave, where is thy victory, O Death where is thy sting?"

I pray these few lines may reach you someway, for I know that such an assurance from me will afford you more consolation than any other message I could send. I wish I had more strength to think and write, I could say so many things, but I am easy and happy. I find great comfort in reading the 14th, 15th, 16th, and 17th chapters of St. John. The whole word of God is precious to me, and I only wish I might live to preach it. I thank God that others have been raised up to preach it, and through its hearing and believing I feel I am saved. Do not regard me as one lost, but as one merely gone before, waiting to receive you to Heaven's untold joys. Oh, be sure to meet me there, where weeping and parting are no more. I have hated to die, and have temptations at times that way now, but what are the moments and pleasures of time compared with the unending duration and untold joys of Eternity. It fills my soul with rapture to contemplate now.

I die the death I have always prayed for, that is, I have ample time for meditation upon and preparation for this great and final change. I am well aware that I have not always lived as I should, and perhaps this is my punishment that I must die away from home and friends, but Christ is my friend and comforter, and I feel I am not alone.

I would love to write more, but if this reaches you it will do perhaps.

Give Frank Woods a nice book from my library, and one to Albert Damon. Everything else I leave at your disposal.

Farewell until we meet in Heaven.

Your loving son and brother,

W. B. Persons