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"A Nice, Beautiful, Active, & Faithful Friend": Horses & Emotion In The Civil War Letters Of Two Union Officers, Allen F. Horn Iv

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Horses are the unsung heroes of the American Civil War. Both armies relied heavily on equines for a variety of tasks. They carried cavalry soldiers on the battlefield and pulled wagons for artillery and military supply chains. Horses could also serve as companion animals. Soldiers formed friendships with their horses as a way to heal from the trauma of combat and stave off the monotony of camp life. Writing about animals in letters to their families enabled soldiers to explain their experiences in more palatable terms to their families. As over 1.2 million horses and mules died in the conflict, …