{"id":3809,"date":"2011-04-27T09:14:57","date_gmt":"2011-04-27T14:14:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/housedivided.dickinson.edu\/sites\/blogdivided\/?p=3809"},"modified":"2011-04-27T14:04:45","modified_gmt":"2011-04-27T19:04:45","slug":"kirkland-journey-to-washington","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/housedivided.dickinson.edu\/sites\/blogdivided\/2011\/04\/27\/kirkland-journey-to-washington\/","title":{"rendered":"C. P. Kirkland\u2019s Journey to Washington, DC"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu\/node\/24458\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-3810\" title=\"Washington, DC\" src=\"http:\/\/housedivided.dickinson.edu\/sites\/blogdivided\/files\/2011\/04\/HD_WashingtonDCpm1852z1-300x206.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"206\" srcset=\"https:\/\/housedivided.dickinson.edu\/sites\/blogdivided\/files\/2011\/04\/HD_WashingtonDCpm1852z1-300x206.jpg 300w, https:\/\/housedivided.dickinson.edu\/sites\/blogdivided\/files\/2011\/04\/HD_WashingtonDCpm1852z1.jpg 508w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>One hundred fifty years ago <a href=\"http:\/\/hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu\/panel\/this_date\/1861-04-27\" target=\"_blank\">today<\/a> C. P. Kirkland, Jr. <a href=\"http:\/\/hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu\/node\/36752\" target=\"_blank\">wrote home<\/a> and described his journey  from <a href=\"http:\/\/hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu\/node\/11864\" target=\"_blank\">New York City<\/a> to <a href=\"http:\/\/hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu\/node\/9046\" target=\"_blank\">Washington DC<\/a>. Kirkland was a member of the 71st New York Infantry and his regiment had been sent to defend Washington DC after the attack on <a href=\"http:\/\/hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu\/node\/9607\" target=\"_blank\">Fort Sumter<\/a>. The 71st New York had to endure a number of hardships on their trip, including poor quality of food. In New York Kirkland boarded the <em>R. R. Cuyler<\/em>, which as <a href=\"http:\/\/hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu\/node\/36752\" target=\"_blank\">Kirkland described<\/a>, \u201cwas very filthy, redolent of decayed meat, [and] bilge-water.\u201d  The soldiers\u2019 rations were even worse. \u201cThe eating was perfectly disgusting \u2013 the junk was served out to the men from <em>the hands of the cook<\/em>,\u201d as Kirkland noted. While he \u201ccould not touch it\u201d at first, Kirkland explained that he eventually \u201creconciled to it\u201d and was now \u201ccapable of eating any thing.\u201d After this experience, Kirkland noted that he would never \u201ccomplain about dirty water, molasses, or any thing else, that may have a few hairs, croton bugs, or any such thing in it.\u201d Yet despite their &#8220;sufferings,&#8221; Kirkland observed that the men of the 71st New York &#8220;are sustained by the conviction that we are actuated by the spirit of a pure and a holy patriotism, and that our course is approved by all the good on earth, and by our Father in Heaven.&#8221; After Kirkland&#8217;s regiment disembarked in Annapolis, they continued on to Washington DC. You can read Kirkland\u2019s <a href=\"http:\/\/hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu\/node\/36752\" target=\"_blank\">entire letter<\/a> on House Divided. In addition, you can learn more 71st New York Infantry Regiment from the sources listed on <a href=\"http:\/\/housedivided.dickinson.edu\/sites\/blogdivided\/files\/2011\/04\/CivilWar_NY_71st.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">this unit bibliography<\/a> from the<a href=\"http:\/\/www.ahco.army.mil\/site\/finding_aid.html\" target=\"_blank\"> U.S. Army Military History Institute<\/a> in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One hundred fifty years ago today C. P. Kirkland, Jr. wrote home and described his journey from New York City to Washington DC. Kirkland was a member of the 71st New York Infantry and his regiment had been sent to defend Washington DC after the attack on Fort Sumter. The 71st New York had to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[80,172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3809","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-civil-war-1861-1865","category-letters-diaries"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/housedivided.dickinson.edu\/sites\/blogdivided\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3809","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/housedivided.dickinson.edu\/sites\/blogdivided\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/housedivided.dickinson.edu\/sites\/blogdivided\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/housedivided.dickinson.edu\/sites\/blogdivided\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/housedivided.dickinson.edu\/sites\/blogdivided\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3809"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/housedivided.dickinson.edu\/sites\/blogdivided\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3809\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3826,"href":"https:\/\/housedivided.dickinson.edu\/sites\/blogdivided\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3809\/revisions\/3826"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/housedivided.dickinson.edu\/sites\/blogdivided\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3809"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/housedivided.dickinson.edu\/sites\/blogdivided\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3809"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/housedivided.dickinson.edu\/sites\/blogdivided\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3809"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}