A Recent Visit to Aliceville

Back in May, when friends visited from California, they asked if we would take them down to visit Aliceville. Having read Guests Behind the Barbed Wire, they wanted to visit the museum and explore the town where the story took place.

Museum Director Ann Kirksey and museum volunteer Martha Horton (pictured at right) greeted us warmly, as always, and provided lots of information. The museum displays offer a truly vivid depiction of what Camp Aliceville life was like during World War II. The museum has expanded its collection well beyond just the Camp Aliceville displays, too. Other adjacent buildings offer even more glimpses of the lives of American service men and women and their families during that era.

The Plantation House restaurant was closed for renovations the day of our visit, so instead, we enjoyed a good lunch and visit at the local Mexican restaurant. Former Museum Director Mary Bess Paluzzi, who now works with the City of Aliceville, joined us. Because of her help and dedication to the story, Guests is dedicated to her.

Below is a picture of Barney and me with our friends, Sue and Dave Kjome, of Rancho Murieta, California, during our visit to Aliceville in May.

Chapter One Nineteen Book Club Reads North Across the River

At right is a picture of charter members of the Chapter One Nineteen Book Club who gathered on Tuesday evening, June 3, to discuss my first book, North Across the River. This was a real treat for me because many of those in the picture are good friends I met through the water aerobics classes at One Nineteen. It was so much fun to discuss the story and how the book came about.

Hats off to Becki Reardon for putting this group together. I'm sure many more good book discussions will take place in the coming months. If anyone in the North Shelby area is interested in this activity, please e-mail me at ruthcook@bellsouth.net, and I will give you the information.

In case anyone else would like to use them, I've posted the study questions we used for our discussion below. Other book clubs are welcome to use them and/or to contact me for more information about the book:

STUDY QUESTIONS FOR NORTH ACROSS THE RIVER
1. Were you aware, before reading this book, that civilians in the South had been deported by Union troops for supporting the Confederacy with their labor?

2. If you had been Synthia Catherine Stewart Boyd, making a phonograph recording for her grandson in the 1940s, what would you have wanted him to remember most about the tale of your experiences during the Civil War?

3. Why do you think the Kendley brothers and sisters chose to remain in Indiana rather than returning to Georgia after the war?

4. What do you think is the significance of the sub-title, “A Civil War Trail of Tears”?

5. Based on this book, how would you compare and contrast the lives of the textile mill workers at that time with those of the antebellum mansion owners we normally think of in connection with pre-Civil War Southern towns?

6. Although this book is non-fiction, dialogue has been created in some places, based on tales handed down in the families of the descendants. Do you think this contributed to or detracted from the narrative?

Guests Wins Bronze Medal in History!

On May 23, Independent Publishers announced the winners in their Outstanding Book Awards competition, and Guests Behind the Barbed Wire received a bronze medal in the History category. The awards were announced at BookExpo in Los Angeles last week.

If you'd like to visit the Independent Publishers website and see the entire list of books (a great summer reading list!), here is the link: http://www.independentpublisher.com/article.php?page=1231

My thanks to all out there who helped make this book possible.

Book Award News About GUESTS BEHIND THE BARBED WIRE

I am pleased to announce that Guests Behind the Barbed Wire has recently been named a finalist and a semi-finalist for annual book awards in history.

Foreword Magazine has named the book a finalist for 2007 Book of the Year in history. The winner will be announced during BookExpo in Los Angeles on May 30.

Guests is also a semi-finalist in the History category of the Independent Publisher Book Awards, which will be announced on May 23.

Competition for both awards is stiff, so I have my fingers and toes crossed but am also honored just to be named a finalist. I will let you know the results!

"The rest of that story right in front of me"

Ever since North Across the River was published, it has been gratifying to learn from time to time how the book helped one family or another piece together "the rest of that story" about a family member who was deported by Yankees during the Civil War. Often, family stories have been handed down, but not a complete picture.

Back in April, I pulled an envelope from my post office box with a postmark from Bellmead, Texas. Inside was a wonderful letter from the great granddaughter of Elizabeth Sauls Scoggins, who is pictured here with her husband James in 1895. The picture may have been taken in Rome, Georgia.

"When just a little girl," the letter began, "I would listen for hours as my daddy would tell me stories of when he was a little boy. One such story was about his grandmother who had been kidnapped by the Yankees and taken up North. She would have been about twelve years old at that time. All my life these words haunted me. Why would they kidnap a little bitty thing like her who could have hardly been a threat to the huge Northern army? This simply did not make sense to me."

Kd Wade did some research and found that her great grandmother, Elizabeth Sauls, was one of six children born to Elizabeth Sewell and William Sauls of Jackson County, Georgia. When difficult times came and the family could not stay together, the children were sent to Marietta to live with various relatives. Ellizabeth lived with a family named Sorrell in Marietta. In 1869 she married James Scoggins (Scroggins), the son of a Marietta carpenter. The Scoggins family migrated to Texas in 1895.

Kd Wade learned that, after the chaos of the Civil War, Elizabeth had no idea what had happened to her siblings. Eventually, through a chance meeting with a doctor who had visited Atlanta, she was reunited with at least one of her brothers before her death in 1933.

Still, none of this information answered the question about the Yankee kidnapping story. Kd Wade traveled to Marietta, Georgia in 1999 to see what she could find out. At the Marietta Museum, no one could shed light on the Sauls family and what had happened to them.

"During our seemingly pointless conversation," Kd Wade wrote in her letter to me, "my eyes kept wandering back to a book displayed on the counter, North Across the River. At some point, I remember stopping abruptly in my questioning as the rest of the title hit home. 'A Civil War Trail of Tears.' As I began to leaf through, I could not believe what I held in my hands. Not only was I standing in the very spot that Granny had been taken by railcar to Louisville, but I had the rest of that story right in front of me. I could not put the book down the whole trip back to Texas."

Kd Wade noted that the story of Synthia Catherine Stewart Boyd, told in North Across the River, could easily have been the story of Elizabeth Sauls, too.

The letter ended with the information that Kd Wade's mother is 95 and loves history. The two of them are reading the book again and wanted me to know how much it has meant to them.

"Thank you for uncovering the information and making it available," Kd wrote. "I have no doubt that Divine Providence needed this story told."

I hope Kd Wade knows how much her letter has meant to me!

Cousin of Herbert Jogerst gets in touch.

On Saturday, April 12, I received an e-mail from Bruce and Nyla Jogerst. Bruce is a second cousin once removed to Herbert Jogerst, the German POW sculptor I profiled in an earlier post. (See "Herbert Jogerts POW Sculptor" posted on October 2, 2007.)

The Jogersts requested a copy of the materials I have about Herbert Jogerst. They are making a trip from Florida to Illinois and would like to see the Christ of the Ohio statue on Fulton Hill in Troy, Indiana, during their journey.

The package of clippings and the translation of the interview went into the mail today. I hope they enjoy their trip.

The photo above shows Herbert Jogerst's son Elmar with the Christ of the Ohio statue created by his father, German POW Herbert Jogerst. The statue is eleven feet tall and weighs 62,000 pounds. It overlooks the Ohio River.

Descendant of Roswell mill worker Lydia Swords seeks information

I heard recently from the descendant of a Roswell mill worker who would like more information about the Roswell mill during the Civil War and about the Swords family in connection with that.

Lydia Swords is believed to have worked in the Roswell mill. There were four or five sisters together, and there is evidence to suggest they may have been part of the deportation to the North in the summer of 1864.

If anyone has information about these sisters, please respond to my blog, and I will share the information.