This digital collection of more than 150 Civil War-era letters contains correspondence from the M.L. Calk, W.D. Lowther, and William W. Edgerton letters. Calk and Lowther were Confederate soldiers from Alabama and Texas, respectively, while Edgerton was a Union soldier from New York. The collection is made up of personal correspondence during the war. Calk and Edgerton both correspond with family members, while Lowther writes to his fiancée.

Martin L. Calk was a member of the 23rd Alabama Volunteer Infantry Regiment of the Confederate Army. His regiment was formed under the command of Colonel Franklin K. Beck on November 19, 1861 at Camp Wilcox, near Montgomery, Alabama. Calk served with the 23rd Alabama Volunteer Infantry Regiment in both the Kentucky (September-October 1862) and Vicksburg (December 1862-July 1863) Campaigns.

W.D. Lowther, the second Confederate soldier, served in Company D, 2nd Texas Brigade, 17th Consolidated Regiment. This company was attached to Colonel George M. Fluornoy's 16th Texas Infantry Regiment of Major General John G. Walker's Texas Division when the latter officer relieved Brigadier General Henry McCullough. During the time Lowther is writing, the 12th Texas Division, often referred to as “Walker’s Greyhounds,” was attempting to repulse Union forces in Arkansas and Louisiana in order to rout the U.S. Army’s efforts to cut off Texas from the rest of the Confederacy and interrupt its considerable supplies from reaching east into the southern states.

William Wilberforce Edgerton, a native of south central New York, was a private with the 107th New York Infantry Regiment (Campbell Guards). Following a station at the defenses in Washington, he saw action in numerous campaigns, starting in Maryland with the Army of the Potomac’s XII Corps, 1st Division, 3rd Brigade at the 1st Battle of Antietam as part of the Maryland Campaign (September 4-20, 1862), and, in Virginia, the Chancellorsville Campaign (April 30-May 6, 1863) and as part of the reinforcements sent to aid the Army of the Tennessee for the Chattanooga Campaign (October-November 1863). Finally, Edgerton saw action as part of the Army of the Cumberland’s XX Corps, 1st Division, 1st Brigade in the Atlanta Campaign (May-September 1864), the Savannah Campaign (November-December 1864), and the Carolinas Campaign (January-March 1865). The 107th New York Infantry Regiment was mustered out in Washington on June 5, 1865.

The original materials are available in UH Libraries' Special Collections in the M.L. Calk Civil War Letters, W. D. Lowther Civil War Letters, and the William W. Edgerton Civil War Letters.