Winter Quarters, Culpeper, Va. (Primary Title)
Winter Quarters, Culpeper, Virginia
(Alternate Title)
Winter Quarters (Alternate Title)
David James, American, born England, 1848 - 1920 (Artist)
The weather is just like summer—sun shining so warm. The boys is all out side of their shanties. . . . some playing cards, some reading the paper. . . . I was in the shanty drawing picturs in my book. The ordely sais that I am for picket tomorrow morning. —David James, diary entry, January 14, 1864
In his imperfect prose and dozens of images, sixteen-year-old soldier David James documented his experiences with the 142nd Pennsylvania Volunteers during the Civil War. Between December 1863 and May 1864, he was among 120,000 Union troops encamped in a makeshift city of tents and huts near Culpeper, Virginia. As both his diary and painting reveal, the men found ways to occupy themselves during the months of inaction that followed the battles of Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, and Gettysburg. Soon after breaking camp, they faced grim combat in the wilderness near Spotsylvania.
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