During a war conducted without telephones, Skype, or even reliable mail delivery, Civil War soldiers treasured their letters from home – and lucky for us, because they kept them all their lives and passed them down through their families to us. William Titus Rigby expresses his gratitude to his correspondents eloquently:

“I never received a letter in my life which gave me as much pleasure as these two did. You must remember how we are Situated away from home of course & without any mail for two weeks… when we are not expecting them comes those messages from home. It is a poor comparison to say they came like “Sunbeams in a Shower” It is as though a person completely lost in a dark night Should suddenly recognize the light burning in his own home.”