From the personal Journal of Thomas Everett

Yorktown, Virginia
May 4, 1862. The Lord’s Day

I write by the light of a candle, for I cannot bear the dark tonight. I cannot bear to close my eyes.

I killed today. I set the words down plainly because I can find no gentler ones that would be true. I killed so many that I lost the count of them somewhere between the ramparts and the river. I was ordained to bury the dead, and I have spent this Sabbath making more of them.

Near midnight the sky above Yorkto...