A New Canaan Private in the Civil War: Letters of Justus M. Silliman, l7th Connecticut Volunteers

In 1977 Thomas Silliman of Winter Park, FL., presented to the New CanaanHistorical Society a collection of letters that his father Justus Silliman wrote to his mother, brother, and grandmother, to uncles and aunts, to several cousins, and to friends in New Canaan and those serving in the Union Army. His mother collected 140 of these and preserved them in three notebooks that, in time, passed to Thomas Silliman. Silliman served with the Army of the Potomac, off Charleston, SC, and in Floriad, and wherever he went he had a perceptive eye for detail, especially of engineering projects. His letters show his sense of humor and his sensitivity for the people around him. Although the Union forces in Florida made no spectacular contributions to the capitulation of the Confederacy, Silliman as a headquarters clerk was in a position to read and quote from official documents. Hence the last group of his letters constitutes source material on Florida activities, not the scuttlebvuut that the average soldier heard round the campfire...