Private Voices: a unique collection of American Civil War letters

I came across a new-to-me archive of Civil War letters recently. The project, “Corpus of American Civil War Letters,” under the direction of Michael Ellis, Missouri State University, and Michael Montgomery, University of South Carolina, has amassed quite a collection of letters written during the Civil War – nearly 10,000 letters and diaries written by soldiers and their families from both sides of the conflict.

The writings are often phonetic, without proper spelling, grammar, or punctuation, but written with sincerity to friends or family members — never intended for the larger audience that they now reach.

Browse through transcriptions and databases to get a sense of the private lives of possibly your own ancestors, Private Voices.

Source:  Private Voices | Corpus of American Civil War Letters