Society of Civil War Historians features my novels

The Society of Civil War Historians has featured my Civil War novels on their website.  The name of the article is HISTORY INTO FICTION:  WRITING CIVIL WAR NOVELS.  Click here to read the article.

Hiram's Honor and Hiram's Hope at Marion Library, Marion, Ks

On March 17, 2015 I presented a reading and map of events in Hiram's Honor and Hiram's Hope to a group of about 20 at Marion Library in Marion, Kansas. Questions centered on the life of the common Civil War soldier,Andersonville, Civil War ancestors, and writing-storytelling styles.  Signed and personalized copies of books were provided for donations to the library.

Hiram's Honor and Hiram's Hope at Little Pleasures in Hillsboro, Ks

Little Pleasures, 119 N Main St, Hillsboro, KS, has Hiram's Honor and Hiram's Hope available for purchase.

TWO REVIEWS OF HIRAM'S HOPE

Two reviews of Hiram's Hope, the sequel to Hiram's Honor have been received. To see the reviews, click here.

The Andersonville Survivors Trek to Vicksburg To Be Paroled

 

 

I am writing the later chapters of Hiram's Hope and have needed an historical account detailing the experiences of Andersonville survivors leaving the prison in late March 1865 on their way to Vicksburg for parole and freedom. I found some first hand accounts (such as the very good account by Chester Berry and a diary by Smith) and a useful book entitled TRANSPORT TO DISASTER by James W. Elliott (published in 1962). Written by a descendent of an Andersonville survivor, the book provides a very readable account of the ordeals of prisoners from Cahaba and Andersonville as they make their way by rail and steamboat across Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi, eventually winding up in Vicksburg only to board the ill-fated Sultana that exploded north of Memphis killing most of those aboard.  These are challenging chapters to write as I try to imagine the sights, sounds, thoughts, and conversations that occurred. 

Reunion and reconciliation

In my search for ideas on how Private Hiraqm Terman might have dealt with his Civil War battle and prisoner of war experiences, I read Caroline Janney's new book REMEMBERING THE CIVIL WAR.  I found the book to be well researched and written in a way that held my attention.  The theme of the book centers on the difference between reunion and reconciliation and explores the perspectives of Union and Confederaate men and women. As I write the sequel to Hiram's Honor, I hope that the things I learned in this fine book will show up in the story.  

HIRAM'S HOPE--the sequel to Hiram's Honor

The Sultana, an overcrowded boat carrying already wretched and suffering Union prisoners of war from Andersonville and other prisons, unbelievably explodes and either burns them alive or casts them into the cold Mississippi River to die of exposure to the cold waters.  One 82nd Ohio soldier is recorded as being on the Sultana and it is this prisoner that I have identified as Isaiah, Hiram's friend left at Andersonville as Hiram and his ambulatory friends leave for Savannah and later Millen where they were eventually exchanged.  According to my story (which is fiction based on actual accounts of Sultana survivors) Isaiah is blown from the boat into the dark waters of the Mississippi.  Following is the opening "hook" to Hiram's Hope:

             A flash of light, his body spinning in the darkness, a glimpse of the rainy night sky followed by the stinging slap of the water’s surface and the numbing grip of coldness. 

            Oh, Lord, I am in the water, sinking! I can’t breathe—must get to the surface!  Isaiah stretched his neck, his stunned arms and legs slow to move in the icy cold waters of the Mississippi River.  His lungs screamed for air, demanding his legs to kick.  A thumping, crackling sound permeated the swirling cold darkness as Isaiah moved to the surface.  He coughed as if he were expelling his insides; water ejected out from his nose and ears.  He gasped the cold night air as if it were life itself. He sank again, rising, spitting, and wiping the muddy water from his eyes.

            Off in the distance the Sultana, the over-crowded paddle wheeled steamer loaded with Union prisoners from Andersonville and Cahaba and other Southern Civil War prisons, blazed like a fireball in the darkness.  The waves of the cold Mississippi River, swollen by torrential rains and a massive snowmelt upstream, stretched endlessly into the distance, its brushy, tree-lined shorelines covered by the highest water levels in a decade. 

            Consciousness flowed fully back into Isaiah’s mind.  He looked around and realized that he had been blown off the boat by an explosion.

The officer’s coffin on which he had been forced to sleep on the crowded deck was bobbing off to his right, its hinged lid opened by the impact with the water.  The corpse’s head and arms draped over the side and the dead man’s embalmed face stared at him as if asking-- “Did we make it alright?” 

            As Isaiah watched, the coffin sank below the surface, dragging the officer, recently killed in a guerilla attack outside Vicksburg, to his final, if unplanned, watery grave.  Air bubbles escaping from the coffin burst to the surface. They were his final benediction.

            Isaiah wiped his throbbing eyes, trying to push the blurriness aside to focus on the disaster about two hundred feet away.  The fire grew in size, its blazing light revealed people jumping off the sides, others screamed as the fire demanded they jump or burn.  In the water around the dying boat, heads bobbed like hundreds of apples in a huge tub.  Above the hissing and crackling of the flames, Isaiah could hear screams—cries from men, women, and yes, children.  Oh God, what other glimpses of hell are you going to give me?  First the war, then prison, and now this? No more, Lord, no more….

            Isaiah closed his eyes and began to sink. Calmness came over him as he said a final prayer. Images of home came into view. His angelic mother surrounded by a halo of light, went to the door, and opened it. Hiram Terman stood there, his skeletal thin frame holding the Bible Isaiah gave him before Hiram and his friends left the dying Isaiah at Andersonville.  As Hiram handed the Bible to his mother, she turned, looked to her right. There stood Janie. Immediately the warm light departed and was replaced by the cold water of the Mississippi. His arm thrust to the surface.  His hand felt the rough bark of a floating log.

Coldwater, Michign Daily Reporter article on Hiram's Honor

Many of my wife's relatives live in or near Coldwater, Michigan so it was a pleasure to have an article on Hiram's Honor appear in the newspaper there.  Coldwater was an important supplier of Union soldiers for Michigan during the American Civil War and interest in the war runs deep there.  Even though my ancestor was from Ohio, telling his story helps showcase the experiences of all Civil War soldiers, including those from Michigan. Many thanks to the Daily Reporter. To read the article see http://www.thedailyreporter.com/article/20130520/NEWS/130529991.

April 1865 by Jay Winik

Robert E. Lee

U. S. Grant

Abraham Lincoln

As part of my research for the sequel to Hiram's Honor, I read Jay Winicks April 1865. This book focuses on the month, that among other happenings, saw the fall of Richmond, the surrender of Robert E. Lee to U. S. Grant at Appomattox, the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln, and the surrender of Joseph Johnson's army to General William Sherman. Since I wanted to get a feel for the deeper and personal meanings of the war at its end, this book proved very helpful. Winik put the war and the people into context using an engaging but factually rich style. The main point was that this conflict, unlike many others, ended without a prolonged and agonizing guerilla war, primarily due to the conciliatory policies of Lincoln, Grant, and Sherman and the insights and courage of Lee and other Confederate generals.  My only disappointment was that the explosion of the Sultana (that happened on April 27, 1865) was not mentioned. Ironically, the tragedy of the Sultana was also given limited coverage to the war weary public at the time as well.
 

Pages Books and Coffee Newton Ks book event

 I am pleased to report that Pages Books and Coffee in Newton, Kansas is now selling Hiram's Honor. On May 2, 2013 at a book event there, I discussed the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln, and other topics associated with Hiram's Honor. Many questions dealt with how fragile the United States was as a nation before and after the Civil War and how the wise and gracious actions of Abraham Lincoln, U. S. Grant, and Robert E. Lee saved the Union.

Also, it was pointed out how my ancestor Private Hiram Terman of the 82nd Ohio had a close, personal and inside look at the major events of the Civil War--that he did and I hope that I conveyed this in telling his story.

Kauffman Museum Newton, Kansas now selling Hiram's Honor

I am pleased to announce that the Kauffman Museum in Newton, Kansas now has Hiram's Honor for sale in their gift shop. We went to this fine museum to view the exhibit Lincoln: The Constitution and the Civil War.  This was timely since I am researching the personality of Abraham Lincoln for a chapter dealing with the Lincoln Funeral Train in my sequel to Hiram's Honor.  It is about the experiences of Hiram and his friends after their release from Andersonville and in the post-Civil War years and is based on Hiram's Civil War pension files.

A Feeling for the Old South

A visit to Eden Gardens State Park near Panama City Florida brought feelings of the Old South to me as I walked the plantation-like grounds and took in the columned porches of the large house.  I was in the area for a book event at near Seaside Florida at Sundog Books.

Traveling Back in Time--New Book Review

 

I appreciate a new book review of Hiram's Honor by The Civil War Notebook blog.  It opens with "It is the dream of most genealogists to travel backwards in time and interview their ancestors.  I suspect Civil War reenactors share a like dream of traveling through time to experience the life of a Civil War soldier as it really happened.  In his novel, “Hiram’s Honor,” Dr. Terman, a retired zoology professor, relives the horrors of the Civil War through the eyes of his great uncle, Hiram Terman, a private in Company F of the 82nd Ohio Infantry."The complete review can be seen at http://civilwarnotebook.blogspot.com/2013/01/review-hirams-honor.html.

 

Pathway to Hell by Dennis W. Brandt

Surgeons examining Andersonville prison survivor--the physical damage was only part of the story

I have just finished reading Pathway to Hell: A Tragedy of the American Civil War by Dennis W. Brandt.  It is the story of one Civil War soldier, Angelo Crapsey, who might have suffered from what we today call PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder), what then was termed nostalgia, soldier's heart, or a variety of other terms, if it was identified at all.  Private Crapsey, who committed suicide after the war, left a series of letters that along with other historical documents and records, were psychologically analyzed by author Brandt, looking for evidence that this soldier exhibited PTSD. I read this book in hopes of getting insights into what my ancestor may have faced as a result of his war and prison ordeals.  Few books have dealt with this topic for Civil War soldiers and I found the information very helpful in understanding what Private Terman and his family might have faced after the Civil War, the basis for my sequel.

Andersonville Civil War Prison by Robert Scott Davis

Sketch of Andersonville Prison

I have just finished reading Robert Scott Davis Andersonville Civil War Prison published by The History Press.  I was searching for information on the life spans of Andersonville survivors and for what happened during the last days of the prison for my sequel to Hiram's Honor.  I found the book to have an air of authority as the author is a college professor and researcher.  According to a source in this book, less that 1000 Andersonville survivors lived past 1890.  This makes the survival of Private Hiram Terman especially noteworthy.  He was one of the first prisoners in (July 1863) and one of the last out (January 1865) and yet lived until 1926--remarkable!  To read an account of the conditions at Andersonville by Isaiah White, Confederate surgeon, see this primary source. Also above is a monument in Andersonville village for Henry Wirz and a close-up of one of the inscriptions.  Quite a story here--I hope I can capture some more of it in my sequel. To read the present Andersonville chapter in Hiram's Honor, click Andersonville chapter Hiram's Honor

The Untried Life: the 29th OVI in the Civil War by James T. Fritsh

Battle of Cedar Mountain where both the 29th and 82nd Ohio were engaged.

I have just finished reading The Untried Life: the 29th Ohio Volunteer Infantry in the Civil War by James T. Fritch.  I hoped to find some stories from the 29th OVI that would shed more light on the what happened to soldiers in Private Terman's regiment, the 82nd Ohio.  Both regiments came from northern Ohio and fought in some of the same battles, such as Cedar Mountain, Chancellorsville, and Gettysburg.  What I found was an exceptionally well-written, researched, and documented book with many details coming out of the Giddings Regiment (also called the Abolitionist Regiment named after Congressman J. R Giddings of Ohio).  One that comes to mind was of a sane inmate of an "Insane Asylum" in the south that the boys of the 29th uncovered toward the end of the war.  This sane and intelligent man had been put there by his father to prevent him from enlisting with the Union.  Every page has many such accounts along with the names of the soldiers who lived the stories.  It is a long book of 501 pages and each page is printed in small type but I found myself thoroughly enjoying the journey.

Civil War Monument Quincy Michigan

Many towns have Civil War monuments honoring the regiments that came from that town.  This monument is in the cemetery at Quincy, Michigan.  I came across it while visiting relatives, my brother-in-law showed it to  me. Viewing this statue and the writings on its side caused me to relive the poignant events I described in Hiram's Honor.  Relive the battle of Gettysburg here.

PBS show Death and the American Civil War

PBS presentation American Experience "Death and the American Civil War".  Some estimates say over 750,000 persons may have died in the conflict.  In writing Hiram's Honor, scenes like this appeared often in my imagination.  See the film at
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/death/player/

Hiram's Honor Interview Author Podcast

American Civil War Today Podcast interview with me about the writing of Hiram's Honor is available for viewing at

http://youtu.be/iobmgcubLcE