Homer E. Stone Correspondence, March-July 1864
Vault A45, Stone, Unit 1
EXTENT: Six letters and one related document in one container.
ORGANIZATION AND ARRANGEMENT: Arranged chronologically in a single sequence.
BIOGRAPHY: Homer E. Stone was born on 24 June 1843 in Berlin, Massachusetts to Isaac and Martha A. (Farmer) Stone. Massachusetts Soldiers, Sailors and Marines in the Civil War lists his occupation as machinist. Private Stone enlisted in the Fourth Regiment Massachusetts Volunteer Cavalry, Company E., on 5 January 1864 and mustered in on 27 January 1864. He trained at Camp Meigs in Readville, Massachusetts. In early July 1864 he became ill with “brain fever” (inflammation of the brain), passing away on 24 July at the age of twenty-one. He died at the Eighteenth Army Corps Hospital near Point of Rocks, Virginia and is buried in the adjacent soldiers’ burial ground.
SCOPE AND CONTENT: Correspondence consists of six letters and one related document. Four letters are between family members: Private Homer Stone to Mary Ann Stone, his sister; to Martha Stone, his mother; from Martha Stone to Homer; from Isaac L. Stone, his father, to Homer. The fifth letter is to Homer’s father from Samuel Wright regarding his illness; the sixth to Mary Ann Stone from Chaplain G. G. Jones regarding Homer’s death. There is also a brief narrative, unsigned, containing information about his death and the location of his grave near Point of Rocks, Virginia.
The tone of the letters is warm, reflecting the activities and events of daily family life. Homer’s include details noted by a young man in the midst of his first military experience; his father’s letters have strong streaks of patriotism and religion.
SOURCE OF ACQUISITION: Donated by Susan Dee Johnson and Sherry Dee Mobley, 12 January 2017.
NOTES/COMMENTS: History of the Town of Berlin, Worcester County Mass., from 1784 to 1895 by William Addison Houghton (1895) was consulted for contextual information. The connection between Homer Stone and the Dee family (through descendants of whom the collection was donated) has not been discovered. Accessioned 18 January 2017 (AMC 259).
PROCESSED BY: Anna Hocker, December 2017; additional processing, C. Manoli-Skocay, October 2018.
Container List
Folder 1. Letter from Private Homer E. Stone to Mary Ann Stone, 20 March 1864.
Folder 2. Letter from Private Homer E. Stone to Mary Ann Stone, 11[?] June 1864.
Folder 3. Letter from Private Homer E. Stone to Mrs. Martha Stone, 4 July 1864.
Folder 4. Letter from Isaac S. Stone to Private Homer E. Stone, 10 July 1864.
Folder 5. Letter from Samuel Wright, U.S. Christian Commission, to Isaac S. Stone, 23 July 1864.
Folder 6. Letter from G.G. Jones, Chaplain, 13th O.H.V. to “Miss Mary Stone,” 29 July 1864.
Folder 7. Base Hospital. Notes on death of Private Homer E. Stone.