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Go If You Think It Your Duty: A Minnesota Couple's Civil War Letters
During the American Civil War, James Madison Bowler and Elizabeth Caleff Bowler courted, married, became parents, and bought a farm. They attended dances, talked politics, and confided their deepest fears. Because of the war, however, they experienced all of these events separately, sharing them through hundreds of letters from 1861 to 1865 while Madison served in the third Minnesota Volunteer regiment and Lizzie stayed in Nininger, Minnesota. In four years, they spent only twelve weeks under the same roof. These poignant letters provided them a space to voice their fear for and frustration with each other, and they now provide readers with a window into one couple's Civil War.
"Go If You Think It Your Duty isn't the Civil War history of textbooks or lecture halls. It's the kind we seldom see—the kind tucked away in forgotten, dusty packets of letters in forgotten trunks in attic corners. The letters here are less about the war than about the hopes and concerns of a man who fought it and his wife waiting back home." —The Associated Press
"Go If You Think It Your Duty isn't the Civil War history of textbooks or lecture halls. It's the kind we seldom see—the kind tucked away in forgotten, dusty packets of letters in forgotten trunks in attic corners. The letters here are less about the war than about the hopes and concerns of a man who fought it and his wife waiting back home." —The Associated Press
354 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 15, 2008
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
February 13, 2014
Perhaps you're among those who don't jump at the chance to read a nonfiction account of the civil war. If that's true, you may have nonchalantly passed by this book without giving it a glance; and if that's true, you've missed a thoughtful, well-organized book that examines the conflict between the states in a whole different light.
I heard this author interviewed on the Civil War Talk Radio podcast some time back, and she told the story of the husband and wife whose letters comprise this book so compellingly that I had to buy it, and I'm glad I did.
Just another collection of old letters, you think? Ah, not at all. This is a story of love and conflict, adversity and triumph, and the letters are the means the couple have at their disposal to tell you their story.
This book is a treasure because it's one of the very few instances in any history, personal or otherwise,in which you get both sides of the letters. All too often, you get only one side of the conversation. Not so here. Andrea Foroughi does a magnificent job of organizing the letters in a way that lets you see the undercurrents of conflict brought on by war and separation and the overarching component of love that carries this couple through their years of separation and reunites them, presumably stronger and more in love than they might have been had there been no war and no separation.
You will come to love the voices of the Bowlers. She is less educated, and she feels that keenly and references it from time to time. He is deeply in love with her, but he feels duty bound to serve in the Union army. She is less committed initially to the idea, but anyone who reads this can never suggest she isn't loyal to the union in her own way.
It strikes me that thousands of today's military wives would relate strongly with Lizzie, who worried constantly about the couple's separation and its impact on the marriage and their infant daughter. But Lizzie never resorts to helplessness or whining here. She presses forward resolutely, trying to do what amazing women do on the home front in every war. You cannot read this book and not love this couple.
There are moments that will make you smile. Madison teases Lizzie about taking up with one of the plentiful black women in Little Rock. She accepted his banter well enough, and she gives as good as she gets here. He passes on rather quaint advice about how she ought to raise their daughter in his absence, worrying greatly that the child will grow fond of sleeping with her mother and thereby interfere significantly with Madison's plans for uninterrupted prolonged intimacy upon his return.
Their letters expressing how they feel about the assassination of President Lincoln lend Lincoln's death a kind of immediacy that you won't find in other civil war histories. This is not a couple who moved in grand circles. They are young Americans mourning the loss of a truly great leader, and they already know of his greatness. In one letter, Madison likens Lincoln to Washington.
This compilation of letters will remind you anew of the value of keeping seemingly mundane things like journal entries and even emails. We live in a society now where such documents are ephemeral at best in a digital age. I wonder how future historians will accurately portray our day and time.
Finally, I think Foroughi did an excellent job editing this. You see her hand in terms of the organization of the letters, but she is intelligent enough not to pontificate and impress us with her own knowledge of the time. Rather, she has an almost-intuitive sense that the Bowlers can far more appropriately tell their story than she can, and she lets them do that with real editorial grace.
So who should avoid this? Not many. If your eyes glaze over when reading something longer than a tweet, it might be ok for you to avoid this. This book is the product of a time when letter writing was an art form. So you'll read about weather and crops and ill health and all, but you'll rapidly come to see that such things make up the fabric of life for this couple, and you'll be ultimately glad you vicariously participated in their lives.
I heard this author interviewed on the Civil War Talk Radio podcast some time back, and she told the story of the husband and wife whose letters comprise this book so compellingly that I had to buy it, and I'm glad I did.
Just another collection of old letters, you think? Ah, not at all. This is a story of love and conflict, adversity and triumph, and the letters are the means the couple have at their disposal to tell you their story.
This book is a treasure because it's one of the very few instances in any history, personal or otherwise,in which you get both sides of the letters. All too often, you get only one side of the conversation. Not so here. Andrea Foroughi does a magnificent job of organizing the letters in a way that lets you see the undercurrents of conflict brought on by war and separation and the overarching component of love that carries this couple through their years of separation and reunites them, presumably stronger and more in love than they might have been had there been no war and no separation.
You will come to love the voices of the Bowlers. She is less educated, and she feels that keenly and references it from time to time. He is deeply in love with her, but he feels duty bound to serve in the Union army. She is less committed initially to the idea, but anyone who reads this can never suggest she isn't loyal to the union in her own way.
It strikes me that thousands of today's military wives would relate strongly with Lizzie, who worried constantly about the couple's separation and its impact on the marriage and their infant daughter. But Lizzie never resorts to helplessness or whining here. She presses forward resolutely, trying to do what amazing women do on the home front in every war. You cannot read this book and not love this couple.
There are moments that will make you smile. Madison teases Lizzie about taking up with one of the plentiful black women in Little Rock. She accepted his banter well enough, and she gives as good as she gets here. He passes on rather quaint advice about how she ought to raise their daughter in his absence, worrying greatly that the child will grow fond of sleeping with her mother and thereby interfere significantly with Madison's plans for uninterrupted prolonged intimacy upon his return.
Their letters expressing how they feel about the assassination of President Lincoln lend Lincoln's death a kind of immediacy that you won't find in other civil war histories. This is not a couple who moved in grand circles. They are young Americans mourning the loss of a truly great leader, and they already know of his greatness. In one letter, Madison likens Lincoln to Washington.
This compilation of letters will remind you anew of the value of keeping seemingly mundane things like journal entries and even emails. We live in a society now where such documents are ephemeral at best in a digital age. I wonder how future historians will accurately portray our day and time.
Finally, I think Foroughi did an excellent job editing this. You see her hand in terms of the organization of the letters, but she is intelligent enough not to pontificate and impress us with her own knowledge of the time. Rather, she has an almost-intuitive sense that the Bowlers can far more appropriately tell their story than she can, and she lets them do that with real editorial grace.
So who should avoid this? Not many. If your eyes glaze over when reading something longer than a tweet, it might be ok for you to avoid this. This book is the product of a time when letter writing was an art form. So you'll read about weather and crops and ill health and all, but you'll rapidly come to see that such things make up the fabric of life for this couple, and you'll be ultimately glad you vicariously participated in their lives.
May 22, 2008
I will never find my blogging boring again. I made it through 3/4 of the book before I had to give up. Good information about everyday Civil War life and life for everyone else back home in Minnesota. But, that being said Madison should have come home earlier. Didn't they have editors?
August 3, 2017
This is a compilation of letters between Madison Bowler and Elizabeth Caleff. They were in a close relationship when Madison joined the 3rd Minnesota Volunteer Infantry Regiment in 1861. Their letters are very personal and show us how their relationship progressed and of life at home and in the army. They were married in the fall of 1862 and conceived a child. Madison did not see them until the falloff 1865. Madison writes of army life. The surrender of his regiment in the summer of 1862, the enlisted men being paroled to St Louis and being sent home to Minnesota to help put down the Dakota Uprising. During which Madison commanded his old company as a sargent. He eventually was promoted to major.
I've always liked first person accounts of events, and this is a vey good . Telling of life in Minnesota and of army life during the Civil War.
I've always liked first person accounts of events, and this is a vey good . Telling of life in Minnesota and of army life during the Civil War.
January 31, 2013
reading for research. interesting collection of letters, not make a play of it...
June 16, 2019
Interesting collection of letters between a young couple from the Hastings are (Nininger) during the Civil War.
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November 4, 2014Good book
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews