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Titled “Letter to a G.I.”, this letter was first published in the September 1961 issue of ONE magazine, a “nationally-distributed publication put out by ONE, Incorporated, a homophile organization based in Los Angeles” (ONE Archives, n.d.). The magazine’s entire run, spanning from 1952-1967, has been digitized and is now available on JSTOR.  

This love letter is bittersweet, and quite different from the rest of the correspondence in our archive in several ways. The letter is a public memorial to a brief but precious relationship between two soldiers in North Africa during World War II, and it has been used on the national stage to criticize homophobic discrimination in the armed forces. 

The couple in question are essentially anonymous – no personal information is provided about Brian Keith, the letter writer, or his lover Dave. Perhaps this anonymity is part of what makes their story so powerful – Brian Keith vividly evokes the excitement of new love, tempered by the constant need to be discreet and hide the depth of their feelings. His heartbreak cuts sharply, too. Their love story didn’t have a happy ending, and the end of the letter is difficult to read:

“We vowed we’d be together again ‘back home,’ but fate knew better—you never got there. And so, Dave, I  hope that where ever you are these memories are as precious to you as they are to me. 

Goodnight, sleep well my love”

It seems very likely that Brian Keith was never able to publicly grieve Dave as his boyfriend –by sharing his memories in ONE magazine, he could also share the lasting power of his love and loss with a group of people who would understand.  

                                            

Don’t believe everything you read on the internet!

  “Letter to a G.I.” also provides an excellent case study for the importance of verifying your sources and not taking the claims they make at face value. This letter appears to have become popular on blogs and social media in 2013, (see articles like this one),  and many of these posts claimed that a copy of the letter was held in the Library of Congress. After searching the Library of Congress’s catalogue, however, there was no sign of any such letter…

So, where did this rumor start? Older articles provided the answer. It turns out that the letter was first re-introduced to the internet in 2010. It was highlighted as the final story in a series of open letters to President Barack Obama as part of the campaign to end the U.S. military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy (Bolcer, 2010). This open letter mentions that “In 2000, Bob Connelly, an adjunct professor of LGBT studies at American University, found a copy of the letter in the Library of Congress” (Bolcer, 2010).  In 2000, ONE Magazine was not digitally available – it seems likely that what Professor Connelly found was a copy of the magazine itself, not a manuscript of the letter, and a later article misunderstood this reference. 

Although Brian Keith and Dave were forced to hide their love and could not spend their lives together, their story lived on as part of this campaign, and helped a new generation fight for equal rights and an end to discrimination against LGBTQ+ servicemembers.

More Information

  • If you want to learn more about the experiences of LGBTQ+ servicemembers, this book might be a good place to start: Berube, A. (2000). Coming Out Under Fire: The History of Gay Men and Women in World War II. Free Press. 
  • The  "Speaking Out: LGBT Veterans" section of the Library of Congress's Veterans History Project might also be of interest.