8 Pounds of Butter and Cheese: Letters from the Civil War
by Ira S. Jeffers, 137th N.Y.V.
By Eugene Mongello
(November 2008 Civil War News)

Illustrated, 352 pp., 2008. Author House, 1663 Liberty Dr., Suite 200, Bloomington, IN 47403, $13.60 plus shipping.

Reviewer: Michael Russert
Michael Russert, a member of the North Shore Round Table of Long Island and the Company of Military Historians, has a MALS plus 60 hours in American Studies. He is Coordinator of The New York State Veteran Oral History Program.

Review:
On April 5, 1863, Ira S. Jeffers wrote, “Grandfather told me to be a good boy and not desert, tell him I will not stain my name by deserting.…”

Born in 1843, Jeffers enlisted in Co. F, 137th New York Volunteers. Organized in Binghamton, N.Y., from the southern counties of Broome, Tioga and Tompkins, the regiment was mustered into service on Sept. 25, 1862. The men lived in a predominantly rural part of the state and were literate, although Jeffers’s letters are provincial, suffering from spotty punctuation and poor spelling.

Assigned to the Second Division, Twelfth Corps, the men participated in the infamous Mud March. They were engaged at Chancellorsville and served with great distinction on Culp’s Hill at Gettysburg.

In September 1863 the Eleventh and Twelfth Corps were transported to the Western Theater where they fought at Lookout Mountain, in the Atlanta Campaign, and marched with Sherman to the Sea and through the Carolinas.

Jeffers returned home following his mustering out in 1865. He married in 1866 and moved to Nebraska where his wife died in 1871. He married 15-year-old Sarah Hollywood in 1872. He died in 1932 at the age of 89.

During the war he maintained a correspondence with his parents and siblings and kept a diary, however, only his letters appear in this publication.

Ira Jeffers has a wonderfully plain writing style and his letters tend to be newsy and informal. The transcribed letters fortunately are printed with all their blemishers — poor grammar, misspelled words and run-on sentences.

Proud of his service and always aware of this patriotic duty, Jeffers personified “Billy Yank.” He discussed who was ill or wounded, described the mundane camp life such as “getting fat” or receiving “a hair cut all over my head so I look bully.…”

Unfortunately, as with many soldier letters, they are short on battle content. Jeffers did, however, relate some detail about the Culp’s Hill action when “the Rebs flanked us.”

The Ira Jeffers letters are a refreshing and colorful reflection of army life from the perspective of the common soldier. Eugene Mongello, who has been a living historian with Co. H, 119th New York, for over 10 years, transcribed them. While 8 Pounds of Butter and Cheese, a print on demand publication, suffers from no editing and a lack of an index, the text is supplemented by detailed drawings of period artists, especially Edwin Forbes.