What Was V-Mail During WWII?

By: Kristine Kivisto

A quick overview of the V-Mail system that the United States implemented during WWII to bring more than a billion letters overseas while still saving room on cargo transport for guns, ammunition, and supplies.

Millions of soldiers and support staff for the United States Army were sent overseas to fight in World War II. With leave almost non-existent and troops being away from their families for years at a time, keeping their morale up was a major concern. Poor morale can cripple an army, and with paper letters being incredibly bulky to process, the U.S. had to come up with a more efficient model.

The solution was Victory Mail, more commonly known as V-Mail. It was a safe and efficient way for soldiers and families to communicate with each other.

In this blog post, we will review:

1.      The Invention of V-Mail

2.      The V-Mail Operation System

3.      Benefits of V-Mail During War

If you have a box of memorabilia from the WWII era tucked away in your home and happen to find a letter printed on a small piece of stationery, there is a good chance you are holding a piece of V-Mail. Read on to learn more about this revolutionary invention that was instrumental in helping the U.S. win the war.

The Invention of V-Mail

In our day and time, with the ability to constantly and instantly connect with whomever we want, nearly whenever we want, it can be difficult to imagine why an efficient letter-writing system was such a big deal. But back in the 1940s, the only way to connect with a loved one fighting overseas was via letters. With millions of troops and support staff in both the European and Pacific theaters, the letters quickly began to pile up.

Though one letter only weighs a few ounces, the millions and millions of letters that were being mailed to and from the battlefields added up to millions of pounds of paper cargo.

The U.S Department of War was well aware that letters were necessary to keep morale up. They were also aware that the troops needed proper ammunition, weapons, and supplies in order to fight the war. But if they kept allowing so many letters, there wouldn’t be enough space in the cargo transporters for the necessary wartime supplies. Not a country to scrimp on solutions, the United States solved both issues by rolling out V-Mail in June of 1942. This massively efficient operation ran through the end of the war in 1945.

The V-Mail Operation System

V-Mail was, very simply, a process of taking a photograph of a letter, putting the photograph on microfilm, sending the film to its overseas destination, then developing the photograph back into a printed letter.

V-Mail stationery was available at the local post office. It was the same for everyone, a sheet of paper that measured 7” by 9 1⁄8” and had room for 400 typed words. However, if one didn’t have a typewriter, they could use a pen or pencil to draft their letter.

Once the letter was completed and properly addressed, the stationery was then folded and sealed. Letters were mailed as usual at the post office.

Once the V-Mail letters arrived at the post office, they were sliced open by a mechanical cutting machine and then manually sorted into piles based on destination.

The letters were then bundled into stacks of 1,600, which was the number of letters that would fit on one roll of microfilm. The stack of letters was sent through a camera machine that photographed each one, capturing them onto a roll of 16mm film. The film, being 100 feet in length, was tightly rolled into a small spool. 1,600 letters, reduced to something that could easily fit into the palm of your hand. It’s easy to see how this impressive technology was favored by cargo handlers!

Once at their destination, the V-Mail process was essentially reversed. Workers would take the rolls of microfilm and develop them back into letters printed on long spools of paper. These photographs of the original letters were approximately half the size of the original stationery. The letters were cut from the spools of paper into individual sheets, then mechanically folded and inserted into envelopes so they were ready for delivery.

The downside to the V-Mail system was that you weren’t able to send anything extra with your letter. No stamps, no newspaper clippings, no photographs from home, and you certainly couldn’t seal it with a lipstick kiss or spritz of perfume. But V-Mail was massively successful, fulfilling the need for both the morale-boosting letters, while also saving room on the cargo ships and planes for wartime supplies.

Benefits of V-Mail During War

The most obvious benefit of the V-Mail system was the amount of space that it saved during overseas transport. A single sack of microfilm could hold 150,000 letters and weighed only 45 pounds. In comparison, 150,000 single-page letters would normally take up 37 mail sacks and weigh a whopping 2,575 pounds! Think of the weapons and ammunition that could be transported with the extra available space.

But the benefits didn’t only come in the form of extra available space— the V-Mail system was also incredibly fast. It could be much faster than ordinary letters. This was due to the fact that the V-Mail sorting and distribution system could be mechanized, since the stationery was all one page and exactly the same size.

There was also the added benefit of an easier mail censorship process. All letters going out of and arriving to the United States were subject to censorship. Again, since the V-Mail stationery was mechanically opened and always the same size and orientation, it made the censorship much quicker.

The biggest benefit was still the morale boost that mail-call gave to the troops.

Conclusion

V-Mail was not as glamorous of an invention as say the semi-automatic rifle, the tank, or the fighter jet, but it certainly holds its place as one of the most influential inventions in winning the war. V-Mail allowed troops to stay in contact with their loved ones back home, keeping morale boosted even during the darkest days of the war. Letters never stopped, thanks to the support of those back home. And thanks to the V-Mail system, those letters quickly made their way to destinations across the oceans.

So if you have any WWII memorabilia, take it out and see if you have some V-Mail stationery. If you do, hold onto that piece of American history— a small piece of a large-scale invention that went on to help win the war.