I thought we had discussed this before, but I guess we didn't. The reason it is a bit difficult to find the original source for the song is because the original title is NOT Little Rosewood Casket. The proper title is Package Of Old Letters. Authorship is sometimes credited to E. N. Catlin, but I have also seen it listed as "arranged by".

PACKAGE OF OLD LETTERS
E. N. Catlin, 1870

1. In a little rosewood casket that is resting on the stand,
There's a package of old letters written by a cherished hand.
Will you go and bring them, sister, and read them all tonight?
I have often tried but could not, for the tears would blind my sight.

CHORUS: In a little rosewood casket that is resting on the stand,
There's a package of old letters written by a cherished hand.

2. Come up closer to me, sister; let me lean upon thy breast,
For the tide of life is ebbing, and I fain would be at rest.
Bring the letters he has written, he whose voice I've often heard.
Read them over, love, distinctly, for I've cherished ev'ry word. CHORUS

3. Tell him, sister, when you see him, that I never ceased to love,
That I dying prayed to meet him in the better world above.
Tell him that I was supported ne'er a word of censure spoke,
But his silence and his absence this poor heart hath well nigh broke. CHORUS

4. Tell him that I watched his coming when the noontide sun was high,
And when at eve the angels set their star-lights in the sky.
But when I saw he came not, tell him that I did not chide,
But I spoke in love about him and I blessed him when I died. CHORUS

5. And when in death's white garments you have wrapped my form around,
And have laid me down to slumber in the quiet churchyard ground,
Place the letters and the picture close beside my pulseless heart.
We for years have been together, and in death we will not part. CHORUS

6. I am ready now, my sister; you may read the letters o'er.
I will listen to the words of him whom I shall see no more.
And ere you shall have finished, should I calmly fall asleep,
Fall asleep in death and wake not, dearest sister, do not weep. CHORUS