Vietnam War love letters teach lasting power of handwritten correspondence

By DELANEY ABY SAALMAN

Scaramouch

Editor’s note: Delaney just earned her bachelor’s degree in English from Indiana University Southeast. This week she is filling in for her father, Reporter columnist Scott Saalman.

One August afternoon, I discovered my father and his then-girlfriend (now my stepmom) hidden in the back conference room of a local restaurant. All around them, seemingly covering every surface, were meticulously preserved envelopes. Letters were scattered across the room and sorted into many piles. Upon further investigation, these piles were dated. Bright pink sticky notes marked them, careful to not damage their fragile exteriors. One pile was labelled May. Another, July. Individual piles for the remaining months too: August through December.

The letters documented the summer of 1967.

I sorted through a few of them and felt I was touching pieces of history.

These letters, written by Bill and Nancy Young, documented their love story. A love story that stretched all the way from Newburgh, Ind., to Vietnam. In 1967, Bill was on active duty in Vietnam when a freshly-graduated Nancy Market decided to express her support to the brave men fighting for their country by joining a pen pal program. As fate would have it, she became connected to Bill, a Pennsylvania native serving a three-year enlistment. What started as a young girl hoping to express a sort of patriotism ended in not only scores of correspondences, but a marriage spanning 50 years and counting.

Bill and Nancy graciously offered my father their letters. The language that they used was powerful, and the unique insights that they both offered on life and love still ring true even today, inspiring my father to compile and transcribe these letters into book form. He enlisted me to co-edit and design the book, Vietnam War Love Story: The Love Letters of Bill and Nancy Young (1967), which is now available on Amazon.

Photo provided by Scott Saalman

Their story of falling in love across the world from each other without ever having met is certainly romantic. But what makes their story as special as it is can be found in the very letters that united them. Their letters are beautiful. They’re articulate, prettily honest, and express a deep yearning for connection.

In the months that I worked on this book, I became struck with the notion that I’ve never carefully saved hundreds of text messages or emails the way that Bill and Nancy saved their handwritten letters – though technology makes this easy – nor do I communicate to others through electronic means the way that Bill and Nancy so eloquently spoke to each other through their letters, which are filled with vibrant, earnest, descriptive writing:

• “Seven hours ago, I took the locket from your letter. Four hours ago, we fought our way out of a sniper’s ambush. It was hanging on my neck among my dog tags flowing among the sweat on a bare chest, next minute it was floating in rice paddies, water and mud … I kid you not, while I fired a 100 rounds and was changing ammo, all I could think of was your next letter and when I could feel a hand instead of paper … Those four big letters, that one word on the front, makes me want to wear it to hell and back.”
• “The one thing I do have is love for you and a need that rivals that of flowers needing rain.”
• “The words and feeling you’ve given me … the love I’ve fallen into … has done more for me than anything in my life.”
• “With every letter I receive, I seem to only love you more. I’ve never been this way before. I don’t know what I’ve ever done without you. You’ve got to come home – it’s all I live for.”

It was due to this intense use of language that Bill and Nancy were able to fall so deeply in love with each other without even having met. Their use of letter writing as the only way to reach each another created a mode of communication so potent that it diminished all barriers that kept them apart until they knew that they were destined for each other.

Bill and Nancy’s love story seems to be living proof of the sheer power that letter writing holds as a communicative tool, as it joined two complete strangers on opposite sides of the world in a marriage spanning half a century.

In the time that I spent editing this book compiled of cherished letters from decades ago, it was made clear to me that something is missing from how we communicate. Something that we started losing the moment that we began to neglect the art of letter writing in favor for our modern methods. I fear that the masterfully expressive use of language demonstrated by Bill and Nancy is something that is largely missing from how we communicate with those around us today.

Though we can now text or call a loved one at a moment’s notice, we should still find time to craft a letter that details what they mean to us, a letter for them to find in their mailbox as a loving surprise, reminding them of simpler times and the beauty of handwritten sentiment. They’ll probably keep that letter for decades to come. I know I would. The Bill and Nancy of 1967 convinced me of this.

(Editor’s Note: This is an abridged version of her senior dissertation. She can be reached at delaneyaby1957@gmail.com. Or better yet, write her a letter.)