Web Author's Notes:
This is a open letter from the Captains and two Lieutenants of Companies B and E, while these two units were first forming up and training at Camp Tiffin in Wooster, Ohio, to the citizens of Holmes County, Ohio. It was published in the Holmes County Farmer newspaper.

The senior officers of the two Companies are asking the citizens of Holmes County to refrain from providing more food, in the form of picnics, to the soldiers, and instead, bring them clothing and other items they will need during the upcoming winter. The letter may be partly in response to the very picnic being planned by Holmes County residents and which was advertised in the same edition of the newspaper (see article below letter).

Richard W. Taneyhill (Tannyhill/Tanneyhill) was Captain of Company E. He resigned from the 16th Ohio on March 1, 1864, and re-enlisted as a Private in Company I of the 76th OVI.

William Spangler was Captain of Company B and Joseph Edgar was his 1st Lieutenant. Capt. Spangler would die of sickness a few months later on January 19, 1862, at home. Lt. Edgar was promoted to Captain but would be killed at the Battle of Tazewell, Tennessee, less than a year later, on August 6, 1862. Lt. Robert W. Liggett would be promoted to replace Edgar but would be dismissed by Secretary Stanton of the War Department on March 13, 1863, for unspecified political reasons. Liggett appealed his dismissal directly to President Lincoln and would eventually be re-commissioned as a Captain in the 166th Ohio Volunteer Infantry and be promoted to Major of that regiment, mustering out on September 9, 1864.

The letter was researched and transcribed by long time website contributor John Pierson, a likely descendant of 16th Ohio soldier Pvt. Enos Pierson, Company C.