Then and now, Valentine’s Day was celebrated by young Mississippians, particularly the single ones who made up the majority of the 13th Regiment in the spring of 1863.

But just as in the spring of 1862, when the regiment was posted around Leesburg on the upper Potomac River, none of the available 13th diarists or letter-writers mentioned the passing of Feb. 14, 1863, although the weather was fair and pleasant.

Private Robert A. Moore of the 17th Regiment did, but only briefly.

“This is Valentine’s Day. The boys are generally far from home & their beloved ones & are in no state of mind for such light amusement.”

Private Nimrod Newton Nash of the 13th’s Minutemen of Attala was at home on furlough and we can assume that he and his wife Mollie did not let the date go unnoticed.

As for Moore and diarist William H. Hill of the 13th’s Spartan Band, they paid more attention to the accidental burning of Union Gen. Joseph Hooker’s headquarters in the “fine residence,” as Hill put it, of A.B. Phillips across the Rappahannock.