In 1945 alone, nearly 3 billion letters were sent between servicemen and the home front. Though a vast majority of these letters have since been lost or destroyed, thousands still exist that offer vital insight into what it was like to be alive during World War II. The most common themes of these letters are friendship/love, combat, mortality, and people. These themes show that, although the letters often discussed the combat itself, many are much more reflective of society during World War II.
Censorship also plays a major role in understanding what the political and social norms of the day were. The censorship found in the letters shows the government’s influence on information coming home from the war. This censorship shows what was important to the government during that day; commonly censored topics include information relating to the military (location, strength, condition, etc.), any negative descriptions of the military’s morale, and some vulgar language or sexual references. Some censors, who were military personnel assigned to looking for banned information in the outbound letters, were stricter than others. In some cases, over half of the letter would either be blacked out or cut out by the censor. Imagine waiting for weeks, or even months, for a letter from a loved one only to find that you can only read one third of what they wrote.
Exploring the reasons for censorship can help create a list of possibilities for what the text could have said before being destroyed, but there is no way to know for certain. With this archive, using context and historical knowledge can help tie together stories of families, young couples, friends, and more that have since been lost to time.
