Will Fisher to his brother
Fairfax Station, Virginia
January 5, 1863

Dear Brother,

I will at once proceed to acknowledge the receipt of your & Mother’s very welcome letter & 3 postage stamps, two of which I will use in mailing a letter to her also one to you. I had one ready to mail to her when I received yours, so I mail it this morning. You do not give me credit for what I have written in you letter for I have written both to you & her since my arrival here to Fairfax which was about the 17th. As quick we halted I wrote to her and you & had written last besides, & furthermore I think your conveniences for writing are far better than mine. But I am thankful that I have friends that are anxious to hear from me but I like to have them show that they appreciate them, for I like to hear from home as well as they like to hear from me. But I think we are going to stay here awhile now & if we do I shall write once a week anyway, & I will do the best I can by you.
We had a reconnaissance in force last Sunday week ago yesterday. We started Sunday morning & marched down as far as the Occoqoan River & skirmished around a little but did not find anything of the “Rebs.” But the day before they attacked an Ohio brigade & killed 3 or 4 & wounded some but they had left when we got there. Well we laid on our arms all night & the next day marched back to our old camp & found they (the Rebels) had taken the advantage of our absence & committed some extensive depredations in the neighborhood, but did not meddle with our sick which we left in camp. They tore up the railroad track about a mile below us.
In my letter I sent a note from Roy Cummings which you must answer.
We had a brigade review on Friday by our Gen. Kane & a division review by Gen. Williams on Saturday & a corps review on Sunday (yesterday) by Gen. Slocum. The usual salute of 13 guns was fired on Sunday in honor of Gen. Slocum. He is a nice looking man but he is determined we shall not rest on the Sabbath. We are catching the Old Harry now in the shape of drilling but let “her flicker.”
I was glad to hear of Christopher Greene’s being discharged for he looked hard when I saw him last. He has got the heart disease quite bad.
I want you to answer this immediately & let me know if you got my letter of about the 20th of Dec. for it was a description of the march & I don’t want it lost.
I don’t know of much more to write this, so I will have to close by sending love to Uncle Taggart’s folks. I will write to them immediately. Good by for the present.

From your affectionate Brother,
William

P.S. I suppose you are back to P_____ by this time.