Remembrances of Christmas Past: The Civil War

Christmas is always difficult for those who are far away from home and in difficult circumstances.  In Where Duty Calls, book one of my trilogy of Middle grade historical novels set during the Civil War in New Mexico Territory, Jemmy Martin finds himself gathered around a campfire on Christmas Eve, eating food that is far less than festive. 

     “Hey, Cookie, dinner ready?” Frederick Wade asked. “This boy’s stomach is growling louder than thunder."

    “Coming right up.” Kemp doubled up his blanket and used it to protect his hand as he took the skillet from the coals. He pulled off the lid, revealing browned biscuits floating atop watery gravy with a few bits of meat. “Eat up, boys.”

    Norvell groaned, but he held out his plate. “Sop and biscuits again? On this night of all nights, can’t we have something decent? Something festive?”

    “You were expecting eggnog?” Wade asked.

    Jemmy watched Norvell’s face grow red. “Eggnog would have been nice.”

    “Where’s the jokes, Norvell?” Wade asked, and he was right. No one in the squad had ever seen Norvell in this foul of a mood before.

    “Same place as the eggnog,” Norvell said with a grumble, “and the stockings. What I wouldn’t give for a plum pudding right now.”

    “Wait a minute,” Jemmy said, his mind finally taking in what was being said. “Eggnog? Plum pudding?”

    Norvell turned a baleful eye on Jemmy. His face had grown so red that it looked like a tomato in the campfire. “Haven’t you been keeping track of time, Little Britches? It’s Christmas Day, and here we are, in the middle of nowhere, with water scarce and good wood even scarcer, and all we get to eat is biscuits and something to sop up with ‘em. I’m tired of eating this way.”

    “Yeah, and I’m tired of listening to you shoot off your trap, so just shut up and eat,” Jemmy roared back. It was so rare that Jemmy took on another man that everyone around the fire stopped to look at him. Jemmy didn’t care. He tucked into his food without looking up, because he was afraid that if he did, someone might spy the tears that glittered in his eyes.

Two years earlier, Cian Lachlann, who will fight against Jemmy at the Battle of Glorieta Pass the next March, is huddled in a flimsy tent on the steep side of a Rocky Mountain slope with three other men. The war has not yet begun, but Cian's dreams of striking it rich during the Pikes Peak Gold Rush have grown cold and he's feeling hopeless until one of the other men finds a way to fill this cold night with joy. A Clear Creek Christmas tells the story of that Christmas Eve.

By Christmas of  1862, some 40,000 sick and wounded Union soldiers filled the 38 hospitals (23 in Washington, 10 in Alexandria, and 5 in Georgetown) military hospitals in the Washington, D.C area. Those men, like Cian and Jemmy, missed the comforts of home, the foods and traditions that make the season memorable. Luckily for them, a small group of women decided to bring  holiday cheer to the soldiers by providing a Christmas feast. Elizabeth Watton, wife of Caleb B. Smith, Abraham Lincoln’s Secretary of the Interior first conceived of the idea. 

Carver Hospital in Washington, D.C., during the Civil War

 Watton and her committee went to work soliciting donations. President  and Mrs. Lincoln donated $650 to the cause, and the city of Philadelphia threw in another $2,500. Other cities, such as Pittsburgh, which donated turkeys, sent food, decorations, or other necessities. 

            Washington Chronicle: December 27, 1862

 On Christmas Day, soldiers awoke to evergreen garlands and the aroma of turkey, chicken, vegetables, rice, plum pudding, and pies wafting through the air.  President Lincoln, walked through many of the wards, shaking hands and speaking words of kindness and encouragement to the soldiers. The Washington Chronicle declared that, “Washington has seen this year probably the most remarkable celebration of Christmas Day that ever occurred in the history of the world.”

A year later, Charlie Longfellow, the oldest son of Boston poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, was shot during a skirmish during the Mine Run Campaign. The bullet entered his left shoulder, traveled through his back and exited under his right shoulder blade, barely missing his spine. That Christmas Day, Longfellow heard the bells ringing and was inspired to write a poem. I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day was set to music less than a decade later and has become a beloved Christmas carol. 

Author Jennifer Chiaverini takes the story of why Longfellow composed that poem and intertwines it with a contemporary story set in Boston, where a choir director at a Catholic church uses the song in her choir's Christmas Eve concert. The contemporary story is interesting, in that Chiaverini offers the same scene, the rehersal, over and over, each time through the eyes of a different character. I think any writer wondering if they've used the right character as the one to be the point of view character would benefit from reading this book, as would all who want a warm and comforting read for the holidays. 

God is not dead, nor doth He sleep. A merry Christmas to you all. 

Larches

 

This past October my husband and I took a trip to New England to see the turning foliage. We were driving through the northern part of Vermont when we passed through a grove of what appeared to be conifers, and yet, all the needles were yellow. Coming from New Mexico, where bark beetles are decimating the piñon and ponderosa pine trees and douglas-fir tussock moth is wreaking havoc among fir trees, we wondered why all these pines were dying.

You east coast people are chuckling at the naivete of this westerner. Or maybe it’s a northerner vs southerner thing. Either way, you probably know that the trees we were passing weren’t dying—they’re larches.

Most conifers are evergreen—they hold their leaves throughout the year. Larches are among the few deciduous conifers. That means when autumn arrives, they join the maples, elms and oaks in turning colors and then shedding their leaves. Larch leaves, like many other pine trees, are needle-like, either growing singly on long shoots with several buds or in dense clusters of 20 to 50 needles on short shoots with only a single bud. On young trees, the bark is smooth, but grows thick and scaly with age. Larches can live to be very old. The wood of the Larch wood is resinous, tough and durable enough to be used in boatbuilding, garden furniture, and fencing. Larches are also harvested for arabinogalactan, a thickener used in food, rosin, turpentine, and essential oils.

Larches, along with pines and spruces, make up the boreal forest, which the world's largest land biome.

In North America, it covers most of the northern United States including Alaska, and inland Canada. Almost half of the forests in the Soviet Union are made of larches, making it the most abundant genus of trees on earth.

The larches that we saw in northern Vermont go by the scientific name Larix laricina, and have many common names. They are called the tamarack, hackmatack, eastern larch, black larch, red larch, and American larch. Whatever their name, this species lives in Canada from the eastern Yukon and Inuvik, into the Northwest Territories, and east into Newfoundland. In the United States, they live in central Alaska, the upper northeast from Minnesota to Maine, and as far south as West Virginia.

While the yellow needled larches we saw were not dying, there are things that attack these beautiful trees. The larvae of the larch pug moth feeds on this tree, and the large larch bark beetle can be harmful, especially larch trees that have already been weakened by drought or other factors. When late spring frosts cause minor injuries to the trees, larches can develop a fungal canker disease, and a mushroom found in Europe, North America and northern Asia causes internal wood rot in some of the larch species.

Larches are northern trees, abundant in the taigas surrounding the north pole. They do not grow in New Mexico, so it’s not surprising that my husband and I didn’t recognize them. We didn’t even notice them when we were in Maine during the summer, when their needles were as green as the piñons and ponderosas were used to, but in fall they add to the show. We’re glad we’ve made their acquaintance.

Great Christmas Books for Middle Grade Readers

 

Great Christmas Books for Middle Grade Readers

  Everyone loves a good Christmas read. Here's a short list of some of the best for middle grade readers.

Jingle Night, the second in The Anderson Chronicles, my series of contemporary novels for middle grade readers. Hector Anderson just can't get in the holiday spirit. He's loaded down with homework, and too broke to buy presents for his family or his heart throb, Sandy. Meanwhile, sister Chloe wants to be the angel of death in the holiday play, a role as silent as younger brother Calvin's been since the loss of his hand puppet, Mr. Buttons. Little brother Stevie can only remember four words from the song he must sing at the Little Leapers Preschool Pageant, but he uses his slingshot to spread Christmas cheer, which Hec's perfectionist Father doesn't appreciate. Hec is determined to solve his problems, and while Mom tries to eggnog and carol everyone into the Christmas spirit, he and his best buddy Eddie embark on a madcap plan to solve Hec's Christmas dilemma.




As if reenacting the game of Clue, The Green Glass House takes place in an old inn that's usually quiet at Christmastime. But this year, it fills with a hodge-podge of quirky guests, all of whom seem to be searching for the answer to a different mystery. Twelve-year-old Milo, the innkeepers' adopted son, turns into the sleuth who must solve them all. This story is part mystery, part folk tale, and part ghost story, with enough twists and turns to keep even the most finicky reader entertained.

The main character in Richard Peck's A Season of Gifts is twelve year old Bob, the son of a preacher and new kid in town, but the heart of this sequel to the Newbery Award winning A Long Way to Chicago and the Newbery Honor book A Year Down Yonder is the eccentric Mrs. Dowdel, an elderly, grumpy, gun-wielding woman who claims to have no interest in neighboring or in church, but has special gifts to share with both her neighbors and their new church.

 Children of Christmas has six stories by the Newbery Honor winning author Cynthia Rylant that are perfect for reading aloud, if you can control your emotions. Like Hans Christian Andersen's Little Match Girl, these poignant stories of lonely and desperate people are are  guaranteed to make you cry, yet her exquisite writing also conveys the special joy of the season, Stories include one of a lonely man who raises Christmas trees, a stray cat who finds shelter, an elderly widower missing his wife, an Appalachian boy who waits each year for a train bringing gifts, and more.

 From Anna, by Jean Little, begins in Germany in 1933. Anna Solden is the youngest and clumsiest in a large family that treats her like the incompetent baby. After they immigrate to America to escape the worsening political scene, the family discovers that Anna can barely see. A new pair of glasses and a special class for the visually impaired helps her blossom into a proficient and confident child. The climax features a Christmas during the depression that might have been dismal had it not been for the pluck and cheerfulness of the family, and at which Anna comes into her own and proves to her family - and herself - that she can do anything she sets her mind to.

How was Christmas celebrated in 13th century England? Nathaniel Marshall, the son of a knight, spends Christmas at Glastonbury Abbey in my novel On Fledgling Wings. Nathaniel waits to see if the legend that the animals will speak at midnight is true, wonders if the saints looking down on him from the church friezes are watching him, and gets to serve the roast boar at the Christmas day banquet. But all too soon the peace of the season will pass, and Nathaniel will be embroiled in a battle for power at the manor house.