The bulk of the George F. Shepherd Papers are the Civil War letters Shepherd wrote to his wife. There are also a very few of her letters to him, and one letter from Shepherd's brother, Amos W. Shepherd, Co. A, 2nd Minnesota Cavalry, Fort Ridgely, Minnesota, to Martha. Included also are eleven letters from Martha's family in Guernsey, most of them written by her sister, Cathrine Fluere, 1858-1866; and records, 1859-1873, such as deeds, Shepherd's Certificate of Discharge from the ship Amulet, April 13, 1857, his declaration of intention to become a citizen of the United States, November 2, 1860, and notification of drafts sent to Martha V. Shepherd for extra pay due her during Shepherd's period of service from the Volunteer Aid Fund. Filed with the papers are some biographical notes, a copy of Martha Shepherd Foster's obituary from The Eagle (Augusta, Wisconsin), a photograph of Martha in her coffin, a tintype of George Shepherd in the uniform of the Union Army, and some manuscript poetry saved by Martha Shepherd during Shepherd's absence during the Civil War.
After Martha Foster's death in 1901 the letters were in the custody of her daughter, Laura Shepherd Flick. At her request they became the charge of Mrs. Frank (Verna) Scott, possibly a descendant of Martha Shepherd's sister-in-law, Mrs. Charles Scott. Before her death, Mrs. Scott sent the letters to a sister in Montana, Mrs. Bessie Temple, who gave them to her niece, Mrs. Harry Fristad, in 1967. Early in 1971, Mr. and Mrs. Fristad, retired Augusta, Wisconsin area farmers, arranged with Dr. Frederick Kremple of Wisconsin State University-Stevens Point to loan the letters to the State Historical Society of Wisconsin for copying. Microfilming was decided upon as the optimum method of reproduction for the collection due to the faded and deteriorating condition of some of the documents.
The collection is organized in four categories: Letters from the Isle of Guernsey, 1858-1866; Civil War Letters, 1862-1866 and undated; Records, 1857-1873; and Miscellaneous - biographical information, photographs, and poetry. Each category is arranged chronologically.
The Civil War letters are those of one of the common denominator of American immigrant farmer pressed temporarily into military service for the Union cause. As such, they are of special interest. Although idiosyncrasies of spelling and syntax add to the difficulties inherent in reading faded, often penciled, letters, these obstacles do not obscure the value of the letters for the researcher concerned with the Wisconsin Infantry Volunteer, the soldier in Sherman's Army, the mid-nineteenth century immigrant, and/or the Wisconsin pioneer farmer.
The letters reveal Shepherd's concern for the problems of the family and the farm with which he left his wife, his personal fears, discomforts and illnesses, his opinion of the hospitals in which he was confined and the battles in which he fought. In one letter (December 24, 1864) Shepherd details his respect and affection for General “Billy” Sherman and the privations of that march to the sea. He writes poignantly of his longing to return to his family, realistically in regard to his wife's management of their farm and financial responsibilities, and, on occasion, descriptively of the country through which he passed.
In a letter dated December 21, 1864, Shepherd writes of the capture of Savannah, Georgia. On April 24, 1865, he mentions the shock of Lincoln's death as he had earlier alluded to a universal interest in the question of McClellan versus Lincoln in the presidential election of 1864.
Shepherd's reasons for enlisting, whatever they may have been, very probably did not include a dedication to the cause of the Negro of whom he wrote:
...the Black Bugers...I see so many of them that I hate the name of them...running a long in the rear with he wagon trans by the hundreds...eating up our reashens....(August 30, 1864)
and
...to Se and to Smell the old Batle fields to Se the dead horses and muels and men Not A half Covered you tell them that Love negers to go and Live_with them I dont Love the negrow nar the Contery the Live in....(July 19, 1864)
Whatever patriotic fervor he felt was sorely tried by the realities of army life. Shepherd's letters are a sad chronicle of frustration and distress punctuated with religious pronunciations to sustain him in the ordeal.
An early letter, September 24, 1858, written by relatives in Guernsey is filled with the questions of those contemplating emigration. Later Guernsey letters detail little pieces of news and tragedy of family and old friends, the current status of a family business, and the prospects and cost of living on the island.
