I thank you for your reply and I have not yet looked at the link you sent, I'm going there next. I had already decided that Richard was captured by the Union Army since he was sent to a Union prison and had to sign the oath. His papers said that he was sent to "North of the Ohio" to be freed and then he was discharged on July 31, 1864. I used to study the Civil War quite a bit but fell away from it when I got a computer. I had read somewhere that many soldiers were either captured or deserted during the Atlanta Campaign, I guess that is when some of them thought it was a lost cause. Yes I do know somewhat what a soldiers wife goes through but I also have a little experience with troops all around you. I was raised in Ninety Six, South Carolina and in 1963 the Army was training for Viet Nam in our back yard. We had planes and helicopters flying so low that they clipped the tops out of our pecan trees. The woods behind our house was full of soldiers who would sometimes come to the house and ask for water or to see if we would trade real food for the c rations. I was old enough to know that it was "war games" but my baby brother was terrorized by the activity.

Thank you again for your info.

Margaret