Littleton Brothers Memorial in Toolesboro. Photo courtesy of Tom Woodruff.

New signs at Toolesboro Mounds have been erected to honor the largest loss of life in one family in a U.S. war.

Six Littleton brothers from Louisa County all lost their lives while serving in the Civil War. Their story was forgotten until 2010 when historian Tom Woodruff received a scrapbook from a friend’s relative filled with old newspaper clippings, which mentioned the Littletons’ passing. Since then a group including Littleton descendents worked together to honor the Littletons with a memorial in 2016 at Toolesboro Mounds.

Woodruff explains how the new signs got installed, “We worked with the state and the local conservation board in the county in combined signs from adjoining highways approaching the site and then on site.”

The Littleton Friends paid for the signs, and are working with Iowa Department of Transportation on putting the signs on other highways close to the historical site. Woodruff says it feels almost providential that he found the Littleton brothers in that scrapbook seven years ago, “When you find something that’s been lost from a book that was going to be thrown away. When not even the neighbors or even relatives knew the story and you got to be a part of that, my goodness what more could you ask for?”

A veteran himself, Woodruff says the Littleton story is extremely important to share with Iowans.