Wartime letters on display tell similar stories

Wartime letters on display tell similar stories
Sunday, August 21, 2005

By CONNIE MABIN
Associated Press Writer

<snip> Those letters and hundreds more are on display at a new exhibit at the William McKinley Presidential Museum and Library. The letters, from nearly every American war, share a timeless thread: Soldiers miss the comforts of home, dream about the embrace of a lover and pray for peace. <snip>

Weeks after the first atomic bomb, Jim sent darker news: "I had a liberty up to Hiroshima. You may think the pictures look bad but you should see and smell it." <snip>

1968 Christmas card sent to family by Army Spc. Gary Lee Weekley in Vietnam symbolizes the turbulence of the times. Next to the printed holiday greeting Weekley wrote a few words, including: "Where is Stanley going after his leave, hope he ain't coming over here because this place is pure hell."

Weekley, 20, was killed in combat three months later. <snip>

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