Interpreting Graffiti

The writing of Civil War soldiers has survived in significant quantities. These sources personalize the history of the war, introducing individuals into accounts of armies. Quantities of soldiers' letters and diaries provide sources for a generalized understanding of their mentality and reactions to the war. But those sources offer only a partial picture, one shaped for a home audience of wives, parents and families, and communities.

Graffiti is a different form of writing for a different audience. They are more public writings, likely done in a group or as part of a wall of other writings, without the formality of letter writing, and with a visual dimension, whether it be the size or decoration of the words or the accompanying pictures. At the same time, graffiti is far more fragmentary than letters.