Yours Till Death: Civil War Letters of John W. Cotton

by John Cotton, Lucille Griffith (Editor)

Constitutes an authentic record of a typical Confederate soldier’s experience
 

144 pages, Paperback

First published August 29, 2003

Reviews

[LARRY G. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fascinating story based on real letters found in an old trunk. Written by a Confederate soldier to his wife back home in Coosa County, Alabama. Caught my attention because the author mentioned my relative several times in his letters. Touching story of the basic and practical events that took place even while fighting a war.

[Jayce Lee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Written by my great-grandmother’s great-grandfather, this collection of letters is very sentimental to me. As a Confederate soldier from Alabama writes home to his wife, we get a personal account of farm life, love, family, and war in a very different time. The shadow of slavery is ever present as I learned my ancestor regularly rented a man from a neighboring farm to assist in the harvest. Many people claim to know the motives and thoughts of their 19th century American ancestors, but this book provided a firsthand account, and I finished the letters with an impression that they were more like us than we think: also entrenched in the battle between their livelihoods, personal beliefs, and the climate in which they lived.