The Civil War interrupted the area around Cleveland, Ohio, in the middle
of its great leap into prosperity, redirecting its men into military
camps and its industrial strength into munitions and provisions. Dale
Thomas roots his story in the letters that kept the ordinary soldiers
from Cuyahoga County tethered to their families and friends on the home
front, even as they moved from battlefield to battlefield, through
sickness and captivity. For many, these letters were the only part of
them to make it back--their final legacy to a community they had helped
to build.