The writer of these letters was a mere boy when he entered the Confederate service, as a member of the Fourth Regiment South Carolina Volunteers, where he served during the first year of the war, being respectively in the commands of Generals Evans and Jones. He afterwards served in the "Palmetto Sharpshooters," attached from time to time to Generals Anderson's, Jenkins' and Bratton's Brigades, and to General Longstreet's, Pickett's, Hood's and Fields' Divisions. He subsequently served in General Longstreet's Corps. The letters were written by Lieut. Richard Lewis, to his mother, at various times during the war, and are printed "just as they were written there and then," and illustrate the facts and inspirations of Camp Life, Marches, &c., as created in the then youthful mind of the writer.
