LETTER TO MRS. BIXBY

The 'Bixby Letter' is a famous writing thought to be by President Abraham Lincoln, to a bereaved mother who had five sons, who were thought to have died while fighting in the American Civil War.
Later it may have transpired that only two of them had died, and that at least one of the other three had deserted.
In 1864, Massachusetts Governor John A. Andrew wrote to President Lincoln concerning one Mrs. Lydia Bixby, a widow who was believed to have lost five sons during the Civil War. Lincoln's letter to her was printed by the ''Boston Evening Transcript''.
The following is the text of the letter:
Mrs. Bixby was a Confederate sympathizer, and destroyed the letter shortly after receiving it. It was also later discovered that only two of her five sons, Charles and Oliver Bixby, had died in battle. Of the other sons, one deserted, one was discharged honorably and the third either deserted or died as a POW, according to Abraham Lincoln Online.
Some scholars today believe that the letter was actually written by Lincoln's secretary John Hay.

Contents

References to this letter

References to this letter

★ An extract, ''"The solemn pride that must be yours, to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of Freedom"'' adornes the statue in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific.

★ In ''Saving Private Ryan'', Gen. George Marshall (played by Harve Presnell) quotes this letter to his officers before ordering them to find Private Ryan.