American Centuries

Pocumtuck Valley
Memorial Association

American Centuries > Lessons > History Lessons By Teachers > Letters Home from a Civil War Soldier

Letters Home from a Civil War Soldier

Details

Author
Robert Gruen
Topic/Subject Area
Media, Periodicals, Communication; Military, Wars, Battles
Historical Era
Civil War and Reconstruction, 1861–1877
Grade Level
Elementary (K–5)
Creation Date
2005
Last Revision Date
2024

Related items

About This Lesson

Summary and Objective

After discussing the modes of modern personal communication and the ease and speed they allow us, students will examine the handwritten letters of a Civil War soldier. The students will understand that there was great effort involved. They will also understand that these communications had importance for both the sender and receiver of the letters.

Materials & Resources

Collection Items

Teaching Plan

  1. Students and teacher will create a list of modern means of communicating with friend and family, for example, text messaging, e-mail, and telephone. Working with that list, they will analyze the positive and negative aspects of each.
  2. View 3 letters from John Fuller to his fiancée Ella Melendy in the American Centuries digital collection. Students will be encouraged to read printed copies of the handwritten letters and transcribe them. Later they can compare their transcription to the annotation with each letter.
  3. Discuss what the letters reveal of a soldier’s life, daily experiences, feelings and concerns. List 5 things that Mr. Fuller tells us about his experiences. Also list 3 things he might have left out of these letters and why. Explain 2 changes we see from the earliest letter to the last.
  4. Students will write a letter as if they were a Civil War soldier. They should be writing to a family member relating their experiences in the past month.