Digitize and Modernize War Letters
Budget: £250 – £750 GBP
I have a collection of handwritten war-time letters that need to be transcribed into clean, modern language while preserving each author’s intent and voice. The final text should be delivered as individual UTF-8 plain-text files so the archive system I use can ingest them directly.
Your task is straightforward:
• Read each scanned letter carefully.
• Transcribe the content, updating archaic spellings or phrasing to contemporary, easy-to-search English without changing meaning.
• Flag any illegible portions with a short note in brackets so future researchers know where gaps exist.
Because these files will sit in a long-term archive, consistency matters: one letter per file, file names matching the original date on the envelope, and no hidden formatting. A short sample of two or three letters will serve as our acceptance test before moving on to the full set.
If you have experience working with historical documents, paleography, or OCR post-correction, that will help you move quickly—but the real emphasis is on careful reading and accurate modernization.
Your task is straightforward:
• Read each scanned letter carefully.
• Transcribe the content, updating archaic spellings or phrasing to contemporary, easy-to-search English without changing meaning.
• Flag any illegible portions with a short note in brackets so future researchers know where gaps exist.
Because these files will sit in a long-term archive, consistency matters: one letter per file, file names matching the original date on the envelope, and no hidden formatting. A short sample of two or three letters will serve as our acceptance test before moving on to the full set.
If you have experience working with historical documents, paleography, or OCR post-correction, that will help you move quickly—but the real emphasis is on careful reading and accurate modernization.