In the fall of 1861, 22-year-old John Williamson was spending his first Thanksgiving away from home, hundreds of miles from his new wife and unborn baby. He’d joined the Union Army and had left his home in Eckley, a coal mining town in northeastern Pennsylvania to be part of the Defenses of Washington. He wrote dozens of letters home to his wife Hester during his time in the Army (John’s letters can be found in the book “You Dream Every Night That I am Home“).
I recently read that Thanksgiving was declared a national holiday by Abraham Lincoln in 1863. That raised some questions, because I remembered that John mentioned something in an 1861 letter home that made me think he was referring to Thanksgiving.
The following is from John’s letter dated November 27, 1861: “…We received the box last night, and we are very much obliged to you for your kind attention to our wants…I am very much obliged to Hettie for her biscuits, they are very good ones, and I hope to be able to do something for her soon. Your ginger snaps are very good, and the chestnuts. In fact, there was nothing out of place that you sent. Everything was new to us and reminded us of home…”
But did that mean that the box was sent for Thanksgiving?
The following is from the Philadelphia Inquirer newspaper dated November 29, 1861: “THANKSGIVING DAY. Orders were issued this morning at the headquarters of the different Brigades that Thanksgiving should be kept as a holiday in the camps, as far as practicable…The day has been mild and pleasant. Many men feasted on turkeys and pies sent by their friends at home.”
So, although it appears that Thanksgiving was already a tradition, it became official in 1863. The following is from Abraham Lincoln’s proclamation declaring Thanksgiving a holiday: “…I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States…to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that…they…with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility and Union…”
ChessieWriter 