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Elsie Singmaster was born in Pennsylvania in 1879, graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Radcliffe, and died in Gettysburg in 1958. During her 40 -year writing career, she published hundreds of short stories and 38 books, most notably Basil Everyman (1921) and Bennett Malin (1922). Lesley J. Gordon is Associate Professor of History at the University of Akron and author of General George E. Pickett in Life and Legend.
Prominent Adams County author and community leader, Elsie Singmaster Lewars, herself a 1907 graduate of Radcliff College, strongly advocated education for women in America. The heroines of her novels battled for and overcame familial and social odds to secure educational opportunities. Evidencing her strong beliefs locally, she publicly opposed a 1926 decision of the Board of Directors of Gettysburg College to discontinue that institutions 41 -year history of co-education in the spring of 1930. Leading a campaign in civic and church organizations and institutions, she raised consciousness as well as $ 8, 500, a contribution intended for a new womens dormitory should the college directors rescind their decision. Gettysburg's Elsie Singmaster Lewars authored nearly 40 books and 250 short stories during her writing career (1905 - 1945). Reflecting her lifelong love of reading, she once provided her young school-aged neighbors with oil lamps by which to read at night.
She invited children to hear stories in her home and offered books as gifts to friends. In November 1946, she gave a gift of books to the entire Adams County community when she placed a proposal before the county commissioners to establish a public library. In 1949, when the county library purchased the $ 9, 000 former jail for its new location. Lewars, then president of the library board of directors, helped negotiate the deal.
Gettysburg presents a group of related fictional characters whose stories illuminate various facets of the bloodiest engagement of the American Civil War. Ranging from the first day of the battle until after the turn of the 20 th century, the stories explore bravery, loyalty, memory, and loss. They expose the wastefulness of war and its long-lasting effects, not only for the soldiers who struggled on the frontlines but also for the women who tended them, the children who were neglected in the upheaval, and other citizens and family members confined to the home front. In 1865, at the end of the Civil War, the South was destroyed. Plantations were demolished, the economy was ruined, the labor system was shattered, and several million slaves were now free laborers. South Carolina looked like a "broad black streak of ruin and desolation" (Unger, 1989, p. 414).
In the Shenandoah Valley hardly any farm animals were left alive. Many cities had almost nothing left of their business districts (Unger, 1962, p. 14). People in both the North and South were angry. The North was upset at the losses suffered in putting down an illegal insurrection and the South was angry at not being able to break away from what they felt was the oppressive government in Washington (Baldwin and Kelley, 1967, p. 206). Some of the more serious problems from the white viewpoint were the social difficulties created by emancipation. Where did the Blacks fit in?
Most Southerners certainly did not want them as neighbors or social acquaintances. Southerners felt strongly about their prejudices and were unwilling to make the changes in their society or value system to raise the social standing of the Blacks. Although the Southerners reluctantly accepted the end of slavery, they seemed determined to find some legal device to put in the place of slavery. In their minds, Blacks would never be their equals. Great difficulties became evident, as four million slaves were free for the first time in their lives. After generations of being dependent, it was no surprise that many Blacks were terribly unprepared for freedom.
In fact, some were literally incapable of understanding the legal concept of freedom and what would be expected from them. Many Blacks thought "emancipation" meant they could travel and go where they wanted while President Lincoln's soldiers furnished them with the necessities of life (Baldwin and Kelley, 1967, p. 206). As a result, many Blacks were taken advantage of by unscrupulous whites and Blacks. Two residents of the town of Gettysburg Mary Bowman and Hannah Caseyemerge as memorable heroines after being shocked that war could come to their quiet community. The Home-Coming tells the story of a frightened young soldier who realizes, as the battle rages, that he may die just yards from his boyhood home. The Battleground recounts President Lincolns visit to the site to give his famous address and how his words strengthen Mary, who is distractedly searching for her husbands remains, her clothes still stained with the blood of the wounded.
Victory is based on the actual wartime experiences of Frank Haskell, an aide to General John Gibbon. Gunner Criswell moves forward to 1910 and the dedication of a regimental monument on which a veteran cannot find his name. With these stories, Singmaster renders the painful and lasting ways in which the battlefield affects surviving individuals, both those able to bear the scars and those subdued by them. Sentimental glorification of the battle is not her aim. As Lesley Gordon explains in the introduction, The Civil War, like all wars, was gory, messy, and chaotic. Its effects were not entirely admirable, and its legacy remains contested.
Works like Elsie Singmaster's Gettysburg are vital to our understanding this.
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Research essay sample on Board Of Directors Civil War
