Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

<i>The Children of Bladensfield</i> (review)

1979; Kent State University Press; Volume: 25; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1353/cwh.1979.0033

1533-6271

Mary D. Robertson,

American and British Literature Analysis

BOOK REVIEWS359 The Enchanted Country: Northern Writers in the South 1865-1910. By Anne B. Rowe. (Baton Rouge and London: Louisiana State University Press, 1978. Pp. 155. $11.95.) Every teacher has his favorite boner. Mine has been the identification of Harriet Beecher Stowe as the author of "Dixie". After reading Anne Rowe's studies of Northern writers in the South I'm not sure it was a boner. For the surprising revelation ofthis book is that the little lady who made the big war had all the Southern stereotypes—capering darkies devoted to perfect ladies and gentlemen and cruelty only from a Yankee overseer. It would beless surprising ifthe stereotypes had surfacedafter the war when many longed for reconciliation with the South. Actually they are full-blown in the original edition. Mrs. Stowe is one ofseven writers connected in this study only by their attraction to the South and their origin outside it. The attraction is not surprising. In addition to the charm of its landscape, the South was warm. Nineteenth century Northerners who knew neither the automobile nor central heating would not have had to be reminded of that. For Lafcadio Hearn, born on a Greek island, Southern warmth was crucial to his choice of residence. The same was probably true of Constance Woolson. (In neither case is it suggested that affection for the South depended merely on weather. Temperament was as important as temperature.) Owen Wister and Henry James, bom in a less Spartan time, were attracted rather by Southern ladies and gentlemen with fine manners in old houses. Their love for the South was real; it was also a stick with which to beat the new industrial civilization. Albion Tourgée is the activist of the group. Judge and reformer under Reconstruction, he stayed in the South to wage a fruitless struggle on behalf of the blacks for over a decade. John De Forest shared Tourgée's belief that the South was in need of reform, which the North could supply but exasperatingly would not. But he lacked Tourgée's sympathy for the blacks and stayed in the South only a year and ahalf after the war. He may well be the most interesting of our septet but his best works were written in New Haven and do not deal with Southern themes. Space does not permit analysis of the symbolisms with which Ms. Rowe invests her subjects, but the reader who wishes to pursue them will be rewarded. The book appears a bit overpriced. But what isn't? James B. Gidney Kent State University The Children of Bhdensfteld. By Evelyn D. Ward. Introduction by Peter Matthiessen. (New York: The Viking Press, 1978. Pp. 141. $14.95.) Evelyn D. Ward was only seven years old when the Civil War began. In 1920, at the age of sixty-seven, "Aunt Evie" decided to bequeath her 360CIVIL WAR HISTORY legacy of memories to the grandchildren and great-great grandchildren of Bladensfield. A generation later a typescript of her recollections was given to her great grandnephew, Peter Matthiessen. Now, twenty years later the story of The Children of Bhdensfield has been produced in a beautiful little book, handsomely illustrated with family portraits and photographs of memorabilia of the "old place." The author's style is simple and direct as she tells the story of the Reverend and Mrs. William Norvell Ward and their twelve children during the anxious war years in Virginia. In the fall of 1860 the Wards had moved from the old family home, Bladensfield, to Tappahannock, Virginia where Reverend Ward took over the direction of a school. Life for the young Ward children was filled with excitement as talk of war increased and their father was commissioned by Jefferson Davis to organize the Fifty-fifth Virginia Regiment. Drilling in the streets of Tappahannock became a daily occurrence and rumors of Yankee spies were rife. When the Federal forces took Tappahannock, the Ward family returned to the safety of Bladensfield where they remained for the duration of the war. Bladensfield became a haven for many young soldiers on furlough, and in December, 1864, members of Mosby's Raiders were quartered in the Ward household to...