Wigmore maintained a correspondence with many Northwestern Law students and alumni who served in the war. In this letter, alumnus James Henderson was writing to thank Wigmore not only for his holiday message, but for putting in a good word that helped secure Henderson’s transfer to the Aviation corps.
Henderson concluded this December 1917 note with a cheerful wish that the “New Year [would culminate] in a speedy and satisfactory victory over the German horde.” The end of the war remained eleven months away.
This item is generously on loan from the Northwestern University Archives.
Transcription of the Letter from James Henderson to Wigmore
Edgerton, Wisconsin
December 27, 1917.
Dear Mr. Wigmore:
The picture of you in uniform [presumably his major portrait] and its holiday message were very pleasurably received.
It represents to one who has, in peace times, followed the “tort”uous path of legal learning thru the pleasant fields of Northwestern Law School a thing to be cherished, for it is still further evidence that you are invested in our welfare whether we be students or soldiers.
I have good cause to know your spirit of willing helpfulness to the Law School’s sons, for it was largely thru your good offices that I obtained a transfer to the Aviation Section of the Army, in which I am now pursuing a commission as an aviator as ardently as ever I pursued in former days the much-coveted “LLB.”
With best wishes for a happy New Year, culminating, let us hope, in a speedy and satisfactory victory over the German horde,
I remain,
Very truly yours,
James M. Henderson
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