Writer of heartbreaking 1993 Dear Santa letter sought by former mailman

A former letter carrier has turned to Facebook trying to find the writer of a heartbreaking letter to Santa 22 years ago that he's never forgotten, one in which the writer asks Santa to get her family to stop fighting.

"It was just so soft, so tender and so painful," Tom Hurst told CBC's Maritime Noon.

When he worked as a letter carrier in Halifax, he was one of the people who would respond to the letters that were mailed to Santa Claus. It was a fun task until one day in 1993, when he received a letter signed Candy W.

Her first request was not for a specific present, but to see her father. Then she asked Santa to get her family to stop fighting.

"Well anyway there are a few things I hope you can grant. They are to see if you can send me my dad or if you can't do that then I would like a grape escape game or some thing like that or Dreem phone or you can just bring a card or some thing like that," said the letter, dated Dec. 6, 1993.

Candy W. says that she will be leaving cookies and milk for Santa Claus, and that she hopes he and the "alfes are ready four Christmas."

Then she had one last request for him.

"And if you can squees something in four me if you can make my family stop fighting four me thank you," Candy W. wrote.

"No kid should have to go through that," said Hurst.

The letter was quite different from others that were sent to Santa, Hurst said. While some were written by parents, the ones from kids usually had a "gimme" tone, where kids were just asking for the newest toys.

'I wonder whether she thought Santa forgot her'

Hurst lives in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ont., and is no longer a mail carrier — but the letter has stayed with him.

Each Christmas, he displays it on his mantle.

"I bring it out every Christmas just to remind me there's still Candys out there every year," said Hurst.

At the time the letter was received, he says Canada Post tried to figure out who and where the letter came from, but it was impossible, because the letter didn't have a return address. Nor was it stamped. The letter writer's last name was simply given as W.

Hurst says it still bothers him, that Santa Claus couldn't write back.

"I wonder whether she thought Santa forgot her," he said.

Hurst would like to hear from Candy W. He says he would tell her she wasn't forgotten about.

"I'm just hoping that she was able to make it through that Christmas and that things did get better for her and her family," he said.