At 12 midnight or 1 to 2 in the morning, I am writing in my room, writing in my journals like a Confederate soldier would write letters home to his family. I feel like I'm in a mud-filled entrenchment under constant shelling during the Richmond-Petersburg campaign - June 1864-March 1865 - waiting for the Union soldiers to attack our position at the main center of the Confederate lines at Fort Mahone on April 2nd, 1865. I have feelings of homesickness, fear, and loneliness as does a soldier when he's on the front line.
Then, the time comes. When 12 midnight comes, the Union is called "over the top," and as they gaze across no-man's land, me and my Confederate comrades try to mow down as many Union soldiers we can with a hail of iron and lead. There are no machine-guns, poison gas, hand grenades, barbed wire, etc. After reaching the Confederate earthworks, the Union, with fixed bayonets on their rifles, jump into the Confederate trenches, and eighteen hours of continuous hand-to-hand combat erupts.
As the fighting goes on, I lose 5 comrades that were my friends before the war.
The story you just read indicates that I'm a comparable to a soldier on the front lines. Although I may not have homesickness, because I've already been through that phase, but I am still going through the phases of loneliness and fear. I have no friends nor a girlfriend. But, if possible, I'm on a mission to meeting my future partner (wife) and/or new friends on here.
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Chris Poole
02 Dec 2012, 11:50 am
