Publisher's Synopsis
2015 Appomattox Edition. Study Guide included for academic use: American History, Women's Studies An American Saga based on a True Story documented in the Congressional Record. JENKINS Confederate Blockade Runner is written for every family whose ancestors suffered through the Civil War. Based on personal letters, a Civil War era photograph album, and official documents from the Congressional Record this amazing story of survival tells of a Union-Confederate family whose loyalties were divided, and betrayals suffered as the drumbeat of war advanced. From the stately mansions of 1830s Baltimore to the outposts of Florida during its ante-bellum period, and on through a war that brings a May-December marriage of two dynasty families to its knees - no aspect of ragged truth is omitted. JENKINS Confederate Blockade Runner is as much a saga of one man's tragic odyssey from Baltimore gentleman to Florida settler, to prisoner of war, as it is a shocking revelation of what the women of the Civil War endured as a nation teetered on the brink of annihilation. Losses, loves, and loyalties play on the reader's imagination as Ms. Hill sets the domestic scene of what the Baltimore Sun described as "A Well-Known Family of Baltimore's Cathedral District." Beginning in 1820s Baltimore, Maryland JENKINS: Confederate Blockade Runner takes the reader on a ride with Newburne's Company of Mounted Rifles, through the settler days of Fair Haven, Vermont and along the beautiful Gulf Coast, ravaged by the Civil War. Inspired by the photograph album of family pictures that kept Colonel C.T. Jenkins, of the Florida Fourth, CSA, company during his incarceration as a convicted blockade runner, author Emily Hill, "A Civil War Lady," and current caretaker of that album weaves a drama that is receiving high praise from writer's conferences, Florida historians, and historical fiction enthusiasts. Included in this novel are portrayals of Colonel Jenkins' extended family members including James Ryder Randall, author of 'Maryland, My Maryland'; Admiral Semmes - a cousin to Colonel Jenkins; and members of Vermont's Colburn family, including Albert V. Colburn, a Union Officer and West Point graduate of 1857 - and his iron-willed mother, Lucy Davey Colburn. Historically true to the facts, emotionally true to the past. Genealogists will appreciate the detail and accuracy of the novel's sweep. A dramatic, gender-inclusive saga of family history and Civil War tragedy.
