The following letter from Huttonsville, W.Va., was dated Dec. 5, 1861, and published in a local newspaper:
Mr. Editor: Not knowing the address of the friends of Ervin Starr, late a private in Capt. Albert S. Hall's Co. 24, Ohio Volunteer Infantry Regiment, I take the means of communicating through you the intelligence of his decease.
He died last night from disease superinduced by severe exposure while on Cheat Mountain (in West Virginia).
I shall turn over all his effects to Capt. Hall, who is now with his regiment in Kentucky and who will write his family more fully when he hears of the occurrence.
Respectfully, J.M. Cooke, Asst. Surg., 24th Regt OVI, in charge of hospital.
A week later, the Chronicle published a letter from Charles R. Harmon, camp correspondent in New Haven, Ky. It gives details of Ervin Starr's death. Harmon noted that ''he was a good soldier and a wary scout.''
''Starr, early in November, crossed the many convergent rivulets of the Cheat; waded the cold Greenbriar; ascended the precipitous ranges beyond; skirted the southwestern pickets of the Sesh at Travelers' Repose; pushed beyond their extended rear and scouted the Greenbank of Jackson's command. They reached camp safely, having acquitted themselves to the General's satisfaction. Starr was suffering with a bad cold and a severe cough.''
It also was reported that Samuel King, Esq., of Howland Township, in whose family Starr formerly lived, has received a letter from Capt. Hall, including the following extracts:
''It appears that Starr had been on a perilous scout across the mountains (in West Virginia), in the rear of the rebel camp, and together with four others, they had been two nights in the cold and stormy weather, without fire, and Starr took a severe cold. From this came his sickness and death. He was with me in two battles, to wit: at Cheat Mountain on Sept. 12 and Greenbrier on Oct. 3. He has stood by my side when cannon balls and bomb shells fell thick and fast, covering us with dirt.
''He was buried by troops of the 32nd Ohio, 25th Ohio and 9th Indiana regiments. He rests at Camp Summit, near the headwaters of the Cheat River, where he died.''
Western Reserve Chronicle
Dec. 18, 1861
A private letter from one of the soldiers who enlisted here in the regular U.S. Cavalry, under Capt. Lowell, to his sister, states that Daniel Hartman of Southington died about two weeks since in the hospital in Washington of typhoid fever.
''Mr. Solomon Fulk, aged 21 years, of Lordstown and a member of Capt. Power's Company H, 20th Ohio Volunteer Infantry Regiment, now in Kentucky, recently died in camp with the measles. His body was brought to Lordstown for interment.
''We have seen a private letter from Lieut. Correl Smith, of the 19th Ohio Volunteer Infantry Regiment, dated at Columbia, Ky., 13th instant, but have no room for extracts. The soldiers are well and in good spirits, sleep as quietly with Zollieoffer's 10 or 12 thousand rebels 20 miles to the east, and Buckner's 15 or 20 thousand, 50 miles to the west, at Bowling Green, Ky., as if they were encamped north of the Ohio River.
''A teamster named Jacob Clark, from New Lisbon, Columbiana County, fell from his wagon, the wheels passed over him and killed him.''