I picked this up when I was working on a screenplay with the setting in the Civil War period. I figured I could glean some names from it and move on. I wasn't even on the first section about Angelina before my attention was focused on the lives of these amazing women. Everyone learns the basics of the Civil War, the issue over states' rights and slavery and the formation of the Confederacy. I...
more I picked this up when I was working on a screenplay with the setting in the Civil War period. I figured I could glean some names from it and move on. I wasn't even on the first section about Angelina before my attention was focused on the lives of these amazing women. Everyone learns the basics of the Civil War, the issue over states' rights and slavery and the formation of the Confederacy. I learned things that weren't mentioned in the history books. I never knew that Theodore Weld married a woman who came from a slave owning family. I always envisioned that there were Southerners who rebelled against their families over slavery, but I was never justified with the truth of it. We learned about Jefferson Davis, but nothing of his troubled personal life and his amazing wife who stood with him thick and thin. You want "for richer or poorer, for better or worse, in sickness and in health, till death do us part?" You'll love Varina's devotion to her husband and family. Finally, Julia Dent Grant was one of the best matrons the White House ever came to know, and very few people of her childhood would have guessed she was capable of doing all that she did.
There are many close connections and personal details that help to clarify the war and politics of the era. From Jeff Davis's brother-in-law being the son of Zachary Taylor to Angelina's impressive pedigree and the Grants many friends and supporters (Mark Twain and Vanderbilt anyone?), the circles of society seem very small by the end of the book.
The book is very well written too. You won't feel like you're reading your history textbook. Despite the story being pieced together from surviving journals, diaries, articles and letters, it doesn't have the feeling of reading an epistle or standard report. The book is well divided and gives each woman equal footing. From early childhood, to raising families to widowhood to death, the book is an amazing triple biography.
I would recommend this to anyone interested in politics, history, the Civil War or any of the three women. Once you read the story of one woman, you'll have to see what life was like from a different perspective!
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