Charles Roberts to Maggie Roberts (3 May 1863)

              Outpost duty, near Shelbyville, Tenn.
May 3rd 1863.)
My darling wife,
I have no letter to answer, which I presume
is owing to the raid made by the Yankee Cavalry on the Mobile 
& Ohio R.R., yet I cannot let the opportunity pass that I have of 
sending a letter by hand to Grenada, for I know you will be anxious
to hear from me, more especially whilst the mails are so irregular.
The army is still going through its usual
dull routine of drilling, drawing rations and consuming them.
I understand, at Tullahoma and Shelbyville the infantry
are engaged in throwing up breast works whither for the purpose
of holding the position or misleading the enemy I cannot say.
At Tullahoma the line of entrenchment was drawn through 
the burial ground set apart for the soldiers and the pick and 
shovel disturbed many a dead body in its progress in forming
the fortifications. They were removed to a more secluded spot
but it seemed a pity that they could not be left undisturbed in
their last resting place; but such is war. At Shelbyville one
of our lines of entrenchment ran through a beautiful garden 
destroying shrubs and plants and entirely destroying the 
grounds. I hate to see a quiet home robbed of all its beauty,
but I suppose it is necessary and everything now concedes to 
to that comprehensive little sentence “military necessity”."
There has been a change in the [organization]
of the artillery arm of the service. We are now an entirely dis-
tinct command from the infantry and the cavalry and have