Series I: Notes

This material consists of six handwritten pages by J.B. Harris dated December 16, 1863, recounting the capture of his battalion of confederate cavalry outside of New Iberia, Louisiana. Harris begins by informing the reader of the contents of letter followed by a two paragraph introduction to the situation. It is at this time that the writer begins to write in verse. There are twelve stanzas discussing the succession of events during the capture of Green’s Texas Brigade. The stanzas are predominately four lines long with the rhyme being mainly the last syllable always exterior with no interior rhyme. The poem mentions various officers referring to them with an assumption of the reader’s familiarity. The style of the poem is reminiscent of a ballad and ends with the actual capture of the brigade and its forced transit to New Orleans, Louisiana.

The document continues with a two-paragraph letter signed by June B. Harris paying tribute to his comrades and discussing the actions of a particular Union officer that he perceived to have conducted himself inappropriately considering the disadvantages the Confederate soldiers were faced with. The second paragraph of J.B. Harris’s letter is dedicated to the formal demonstration of gratuity for the Union soldiers’ overall leniency and forbearance whilst dealing with their captives. A small paragraph then notes the destruction of Confederate records of the events by the 2nd Illinois. Then a six paragraph essay initialed J.B.H. and called Incidents of the Race narrates the events of the day, oscillating between technical language regarding the brigade and colloquialisms describing the Union soldiers and the battle.