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[in print] Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands, HEAD QUARTERS, SUB. DISTRICT OF GOLDSBORO', Goldsboro', N. C. Oct 14 1865
[in pen] My Dears
You see I am quite down here among the Rebs—Gen.l Howard makes me scout along on parallel routes, & Though I know just where he is, yet I have been with him but very little since we started. He was in Raleigh yesterday & I was in Newbern. To day I expected to meet him here but found he is one train ahead of me. So I drop a word while waiting. Am quite well, & the weather is now quite comfortable—Dont need any more clothes. Have a soldiers blanket, & this is the best—for riding on —these hard board seats—& for covering when wet or cold. Has been raining to day very much needed as the others & com have suffered from the long drought in this state. Freedmans affairs are in just Tolerably good condition here—& we think much good can be done by our presence
Mr. & Mrs [Panes?] were away at the North, so I was disappointed socially at N.
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Meant to have gone to MoreHead city but could not, Rev Moore's wife, & her husband are there you know—
Every thing has been torn to pieces in This State by the war—as in Virginia—Although our troops were here very little. Soldiers destroy wherever they go or whoever they are,—Saw the battle field to day at Kinston when Chap. Stone of Park St. & Reg't were in. Quite a fight they had.—Rebels now are taming down rap-idly under extreme poverty. They are getting their lands, but what is land good for without crops. Negroes seem happy in their freedom, though the aged & infirm are suffering. I put one of our Banks in N. Borne with good prospects. Give Sammy quinine if it is fever & ague. But hope by this time he is well. Shall hear from you ever so much in Charleston—As ever J. W. Alvord
[sideways on left side of page] You would love to see the cotton fields—white as [driven?] snow. It is the picking time, seems pretty work except lifting the great baskets