Mail service to the Army of Northern Virginia depended on the condition of the railroads between Virginia and Tennessee and later between Virginia and North Carolina. During the first year of the war, while there were no major engagements, the mail came into Manassas Junction by train and was picked up by designated representatives of the various regiments and then distributed. Most letters sent home by the soldiers closed with something like: "send your letters care of Hobbs Co., 9th Ala Reg., Manassas." While the mail was usually reliable, packages from home were liable to be intercepted.

As railroad lines were occasionally broken and as the army began to move, the soldiers turned to sending mail via men returning home on leave or discharge. Mail from home started coming back in the same way. Officers going home on recuitment duty and people from back home going to Richmond on business or to see family, also carried the mail for the troops. "Care" packages from home and clothing arrived the same way. While newspapers from back home found their way to Virginia via the volunteer mailmen, the soldiers in Manassas and Centreville generally subscribed to Richmond newspapers which were delivered to them.

My ancestor in the 9th Alabama not only sent and received most of his mail this way, but he also sent back home the letters he had just received from his family in order that he might have them after the war, should he desire the write his memoirs. That explains why 300 of his letters survive today.

John