By Elizabeth Barhydt
The United States will mark its 250th anniversary on July 4, 2026, a milestone that invites reflection not only on founding ideals but on the generations who sustained them through service and sacrifice. This newspaper begins a series on veterans with a document that predates the nation’s greatest internal trial: the Civil War letter of Major Sullivan Ballou.
Ballou wrote from Camp Clark in Washington, D.C., on July 14, 1861, as Union forces prepared to move into Virginia. He was 32, a Providence attorney, a former Speaker of the Rhode Island House of Representatives, and a husband and father of two young boys. One week later, he was killed at the First Battle of Manassas.
His letter endures. We share it with you with limited commentary as it was originally written.
Over the course of the next ten weeks, this series will publish ten letters, accounts, reflections, or features about veterans across eras, connecting the country’s founding principles to the lived experience of those who defended them. As the nation approaches its semi-quincentennial, the aim is to recognize a part of the American story that has been carried forward by our nation’s citizens in uniform.
Headquarters, Camp Clark
Washington, D.C., July 14, 1861
My Very Dear Wife:
Indications are very strong that we shall move in a few days, perhaps tomorrow. Lest I should not be able to write you again, I feel impelled to write a few lines, that may fall under your eye when I shall be no more.
Our movement may be one of a few days duration and full of pleasure and it may be one of severe conflict and death to me. Not my will, but thine, O God be done. If it is necessary that I should fall on the battle-field for any country, I am ready. I have no misgivings about, or lack of confidence in, the cause in which I am engaged, and my courage does not halt or falter. I know how strongly American civilization now leans upon the triumph of government, and how great a debt we owe to those who went before us through the blood and suffering of the Revolution, and I am willing, perfectly willing to lay down all my joys in this life to help maintain this government, and to pay that debt.
But, my dear wife, when I know, that with my own joys, I lay down nearly all of yours, and replace them in this life with care and sorrows, when, after having eaten for long years the bitter fruit of orphanage myself, I must offer it, as their only sustenance, to my dear little children, is it weak or dishonorable, while the banner of my purpose floats calmly and proudly in the breeze, that my unbounded love for you, my darling wife and children, should struggle in fierce, though useless, contest with my love of country.
I cannot describe to you my feelings on this calm summer night, when two thousand men are sleeping around me, many of them enjoying the last, perhaps, before that of death, and I, suspicious that Death is creeping behind me with his fatal dart, am communing with God, my country and thee.
I have sought most closely and diligently, and often in my breast, for a wrong motive in this hazarding the happiness of those I loved, and I could not find one. A pure love of my country, and of the principles I have often advocated before the people, and “the name of honor, that I love more than I fear death,” have called upon me, and I have obeyed.
Sarah, my love for you is deathless. It seems to bind me with mighty cables, that nothing but Omnipotence can break; and yet, my love of country comes over me like a strong wind, and bears me irresistibly on with all those chains, to the battlefield. The memories of all the blissful moments I have spent with you come crowding over me, and I feel most deeply grateful to God and you, that I have enjoyed them so long. And how hard it is for me to give them up, and burn to ashes the hopes of future years, when, God willing, we might still have lived and loved together, and seen our boys grow up to honorable manhood around us.
I know I have but few claims upon Divine Providence, but something whispers to me, perhaps it is the wafted prayer of my little Edgar, that I shall return to my loved ones unharmed. If I do not, my dear Sarah, never forget how much I love you, nor that, when my last breath escapes me on the battle-field, it will whisper your name.
Forgive my many faults, and the many pains I have caused you. How thoughtless, how foolish I have oftentimes been! How gladly would I wash out with my tears, every little spot upon your happiness, and struggle with all the misfortune of this world, to shield you and my children from harm. But I cannot, I must watch you from the spirit land and hover near you, while you buffet the storms with your precious little freight, and wait with sad patience till we meet to part no more.
But, O Sarah, if the dead can come back to this earth, and flit unseen around those they loved, I shall always be near you in the garish day, and the darkest night amidst your happiest scenes and gloomiest hours always, always, and, if the soft breeze fans your cheek, it shall be my breath; or the cool air cools your throbbing temples, it shall be my spirit passing by.
Sarah, do not mourn me dear; think I am gone, and wait for me, for we shall meet again.
As for my little boys, they will grow as I have done, and never know a father’s love and care. Little Willie is too young to remember me long, and my blue-eyed Edgar will keep my frolics with him among the dimmest memories of his childhood. Sarah, I have unlimited confidence in your maternal care, and your development of their characters. Tell my two mothers, I call God’s blessing upon them. O Sarah, I wait for you there! Come to me, and lead thither my children.
– Sullivan
Major Sullivan Ballou was mortally wounded on July 21, 1861, during the Union advance from Matthews Hill at the First Battle of Manassas. In the months that followed, his remains were disinterred during Confederate occupation of the battlefield and later identified by Rhode Island officials, who returned him to Providence for burial at Swan Point Cemetery.
His letter survived him. It has been preserved in historical archives and remains among the most cited personal documents of the Civil War era. Its language is direct, its purpose clear: to prepare a family for loss while affirming a commitment to country.
As this series continues, the record will broaden—across conflicts, generations, and communities. The letters and accounts that follow will differ in voice and circumstance. What they share is the same underlying fact: we are grateful. Ballou’s letter stands at the beginning of that record for this series.
