Dear Madam:

I have been shown in the files of the War Department a statement of the Adjutant-General of Massachusetts that you are the mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle.  I feel how weak and fruitless must be any words of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming.  But I cannot refrain from the tendering to you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic they died to save.  I pray that our heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the Loved and Lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.

Yours very sincerely and respectfully,

A. Lincoln

NOTE: This letter was written by the President at the request of the Governor of Massachusetts to a Boston mother who had lost five sons in combat.  The letter was delivered on November 25, 1864.  The message today stands as a valued expression of love of country and as a monument in American literature.