‘DEAR’ GONE:Abbi Jacobson (above) pores over a mysterious letter mailed by a soldier in 1944 to his wife at Abbi’s West Village address.
‘DEAR’ GONE: Abbi Jacobson (right) pores over a mysterious letter (above) mailed by a soldier in 1944 to his wife at Abbi’s West Village address. (
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A World War II love letter from a lieutenant stationed in North Carolina to his wife in the city was finally delivered to its intended Greenwich Village address — nearly 70 years after it was mailed.
Now an aspiring actress who recently lived in the MacDougal Street apartment is on a nationwide hunt to find the mysterious woman it belongs to.
Abbi Jacobson, 27, discovered the faded note — addressed to a gal who lived in her apartment in 1944 — in a stack of mail that was waiting for her after a two-week trip in February.
“I hardly ever get real letters — maybe once in a while from my mom or family, so as I was spreading out the pile, I wasn’t expecting much more than . . . coupon-packs,” Jacobson said.
Instead, she found a letter penned in blue cursive by Lt. Joseph O. Matthews in November 1944 that was addressed to wife Mrs. J.O Matthews. He was stationed at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina.
The letter had been already opened and was sent in a bigger, newer envelope with no return address. Jacobson couldn’t resist reading it.
The soldier wrote about living at camp — away from his love.
“The letter is so intimate — it’s such a cool, rare thing,” said Jacobson. “It must have been a really intense time for them. There were some romantic lines.”
Matthews also writes about a friend, Bud Morris, who was upset, and about a letter he’d received from a mutual pal, Ruth, who was congratulating him on something.
He signs off, “God is with you. I love you.”
Jacobson said she felt a personal connection to the couple — and wanted to keep the contents of the letter private.
She imagined herself hand-delivering it to the now-elderly lovebirds — or their children, she said.
“Nobody writes handwritten letters anymore. I’m hoping it’s a little old man and a little old lady that I get to deliver this to. How cute would that be?” said Jacobson, who recently moved from the apartment.
She then enlisted a friend, Todd Bieber, to help find the couple using public records. But days of digging through records yielded zilch, perhaps because the couple has a common name, Jacobson said.
They turned to the Internet for help, setting up a Web site called “The Lost Letter Project” and creating a Facebook page asking for clues that might lead to the couple.
Some tipsters linked them to a Virginia man of the same name who was buried in Arlington National Cemetery in 1999.
Then yesterday, Amala Maeve Matthews — claiming to be the soldier’s second daughter, wrote, “This is amazing! The handwriting is unquestionably our father’s and all the pieces make sense. The recipient of the letter, his first wife, has passed away, unfortunately. Joe passed away in 1999.”
She suggested Jacobson try to return the letter to their oldest sibling — who is still in the city.
A Postal Service spokesman said it’s unlikely the letter was lost in the mail all these years.
“What we typically find is that old letters and postcards — sometimes purchased at flea markets, antique shops and even online — are” re-mailed, he said.