Now that's what I call a long overdue

[Mosman Library]

Washington and Lee University has a missing library book back on its shelves — nearly 145 years (52,858 days) after it was stolen by a Union soldier during the Civil War.

The 1842 book, the first volume of W.F.P. Napier's four-volume History of the War in the Peninsula and in the South of France From the Year 1807 to the Year 1814, was returned recently by a friend of one of the soldier's descendants to the Lexington school's Leyburn Library.

Mike Dau, who inherited it more than 20 years ago, said he was glad he wasn't responsible for any fines.

The school is thrilled to have it – although the set is still not quite complete. “Volumes three and four are out there somewhere,” Laura Turner, technical services librarian at Washington & Lee told the Post. “We’d love to have them back!”

-AP, 15 April 2009