WASHINGTON (NEXSTAR) — One man is on a mission to collect and save war time letters.
Andrew Carroll is the founder and director of the Center for American War Letters at Chapman University. He's collected hundreds of thousands of letters from every war dating back to the Civil War.
The project has special significance for Scott Thompson. Thompson found letters written during World War I by his grandfather, Horace who served as a foreman in the Army, to his sister Garland.
“The letters themselves run the gamut of human experience. And war kind of makes these letters more vivid because there's this life and death aspect to them," said Carroll. "So, the love letters are more passionate, the philosophical letters are more profound. You really get a sense of all the emotions that, frankly, every one of us can relate to."
After finding the letters in a trunk, Thompson decided to donate them for preservation and to help bring to life the troops, their service and their sacrifice.
One of the letters describes being behind enemy lines: “We are a few miles behind the lines now and it certainly feels funny not to hear the guns all day and the gas alarms…” Carroll explained. "If you look at the date, August 15, that's very significant because the real battles between the Americans and Germans are really intensifying."
"I just can't imagine a 17 or 18-year-old being in that situation," said Thompson. "It's so different from when I was that age. That's not what I was doing, I was playing tennis on a tennis court."
"It's about helping to bring these troops to life and teaching other generations about what they did, their service and their sacrifice," Carroll added.
"My dad will be thrilled. My dad is 90 and still doing well. I told him I was going to give these letters to you guys and so he is happy," said Thompson.
“And there's seeing the courage of their of their brothers and sisters in arms that's what makes these letters so engaging, is that they really do capture the human experience, you know, from many different levels,” Carroll added.
Carroll says reading the letters has a profound effect on people.
“Whether it’s giving a talk to generals of the Pentagon or to a high school group, they all come up and one of like, look at that one letter and hold it. And of course, we have, you know, plastic protection and so forth. But it really does make a difference to have that tangible object in your hand because you have a connection to the person who wrote it.”
If you have letters you want to donate, please reach out to Andrew Carroll at www.warletters.com.