Louisa May Alcott – Author and Civil War Nurse by Cora Leland

Louisa May Alcott’s prodigious output during the civil war is too often hidden by Little Women, which was published in 1868.  she’d begun writing as a child and was first published at the age of 8 (a poem, written under a pseudonym).  Her first story was published when she was fifteen, and she continued to write – to support her mother, father, sisters and relatives – for the rest of her life.

When she was finally accepted as a nurse during the civil war, her plans for an adventuresome setting she could reproduce in her writing was, instead, a sordid hotel that had been converted to a dirty hospital.

The nurses soon transformed the hotel into a sanitary hospital under the guidance of Florence Nightingale’s supporters. They learned about sanitation, hand-washing, bathing, and cleaning, which had too often been neglected.  The nurses had been chosen for their zeal for helping the sick and their not too attractive faces and figures.  ‘Spinsters’ were encouraged to apply and often chosen as nurses, but pretty young women were not. The reasoning was that the patients needed comfort and ease, not to be reminded of their infirmities and what was gone.

It was surprising to see a photo of Ms Alcott feeding a union soldier when she was dressed in a Victorian era dark blue dress. The philosophy behind the clothes and manners of the nurses was that the nurses should remind the soldiers of their sisters and mothers: caring, somewhat stern, and sympathetic.

The sympathy she must have shown to the soldiers shines through many stories, such as “My Red Cap.”  (the soldier in that story was familiar to readers of little women as Jo’s husband.)  Although Ms Alcott produced dozens of Civil War stories only a few collections are normally found, and the 1863 version of hospital sketches is read, online, in many places.
However, the autobiographical rendering of her leaving home to work as a nurse at what she called “hurly burly house” is not in that collection; nor is "My Red Cap" there.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwdx-_voteg is an audio edition performed for a book shop in Concord MA, her home town.  An audio collection and other stories are  available at  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwdx-_voteg. Much of her writing is found at Project Gutenberg at no cost and at the Library of Congress online, which also offers her diaries, which stretch from 1843 to 1888.

Ms Alcott, as a sanitary project nurse, fed, bathed, dressed wounds, and listened to very ill soldiers. She was famous at her hospitals for the kindness and interest she showed each of her patients.  She was eager to write letters to families and loved ones – in the writer’s opinion, with more depth of feeling than more famous people who wrote letters for the soldiers. Many of these men were dying – and she was asked to inform them of their condition.  They were amputees whom the administrators felt would be troubled with bad health for the rest of their lives.  (There were very few hospices or facilities for sick and injured soldiers then.)
 

She didn’t hesitate to ask a patient about his deformity or sickness if she could help – and she very often did. She helped to found homes for elderly soldiers who’d otherwise be homeless.

Her sympathy for the maimed and dying man in “My Red Cap” is not marred by any mention of her own sickness and shortened life from mercury poisoning. This had occurred at the “hurly burly house” when she was treated for the typhoid she’d been infected with at that hospital.

Besides Ms Alcott’s literary works being hidden, her achievements have been forgotten even more.  The LOC pays tribute to her, though, as do many other libraries.  The ‘dime novels’ and stories that she wrote to pay the bills for them all are found in replica and  the Library of Congress is often a good source for finding them. The Saturday Evening Post printed many of her tales from the Civil War era.

Ms Alcott’s books and her intelligence were, in the writer’s opinion, often hidden from the world behind her father’s connection to a flamboyant version of transcendentalism (american romanticism, in literature).  Mr. Alcott’s adherents fasted to extremes, engaged in ‘inner looking’ until they were half-crazed.  However, the literature Mr. Alcott proposed for their reading was completely ordinary and scholarly.

Ms Alcott’s first description of Fruitlands, a utopian commune where they lived (and almost starved) was published in 1878 as the short story “Transcendental Wild Oats” (although much of her work appears in many forms). This is a satirical sketch of a family’s coming to Fruitlands, and their leaving seven months later.  The father in this story is seen, by many, as Ms Alcott’s father, Bronson. In Little Women, he appears as the father, a union chaplain who is no more visible when he returns from the war than when he left.

Writer Nathaniel Hawthorne, who was also a resident at Fruitlands, but a critical observer of the utopian communities in the second half of the 1800’s, published the Blithedale romance, with a similar beginning and ending.  In his novel, Mr. Hawthorne touched upon aspects of the post Civil War era that were not often mentioned, as did Ms Alcott in her many works.

Further reading

“Transcendental Wild Oats” by Louisa May Alcott. https://public.wsu.edu/~campbelld/engl368/transoats.pdf

The Blithedale Romance by Nathaniel Hawthorne.

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/2081/2081-h/2081-h.htm 

“Louisa May Alcott, a notable woman of the Civil War” https://www.historynet.com/louisa-may-alcott

“louisa may alcott” national museum of civil war medicine. http://www.civilwarmed.org/alcott/

“civil war hospital sketches from louisa may alcott” https://www.saturdayeveningpost.com/2018/07/civil-war-hospital-sketches-louisa-may-alcott/

“Louisa on the Front Lines” https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/samantha-seiple/louisa-on-the-front-lines/

Biography from her website. https://louisamayalcott.org/louisa-may-alcott

Biography from encyclopedia britannica https://www.britannica.com/biography/louisa-may-alcott

Louisa May Alcott - Her Life, Letters, and Journals  by Louisa May Alcott  https://www.gutenberg.org/files/38049/38049-h/38049-h.htm

Biography, resources. https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/louisa-may-alcott

UNDER A WESTERN SKY BOXED SET NEW RELEASE AND GIVEAWAY! by Cheryl Pierson

I’m so thrilled! Prairie Rose Publications just released a fantastic boxed set—with SIX WHR novel-length stories included. Best of all? For a limited time, this collection is ONLY .99! Every one of these stories is a bold, exciting western read with (of course!) a wonderful romance at its core—take a look at UNDER A WESTERN SKY!

Where do the very best love stories blossom? UNDER A WESTERN SKY, of course! This fabulous boxed set of six tales of danger and romance are sure to capture your imagination as you are carried away to the old west. Handsome marshals, Texas Rangers, gunslingers, and wealthy landowners meet their matches with the daring women they happen to fall in love with, and you won’t want to put this boxed set down until you’ve read the very last story!

Authors Cheryl Pierson, Celia Yeary, Kaye Spencer, Tracy Garrett, Patti Sherry-Crews, and Agnes Alexander spin six incredible novel-length love stories filled with danger, excitement, and romance that will keep you turning page after incredible page until the very end. Saddle up and kick back for some excellent reading, as star-studded romance finds you UNDER A WESTERN SKY!

Though these stories are all different, they are all memorable, exciting, and the kind of tales you'll want to put on your "keeper" shelf. I'm so honored to have FIRE EYES alongside these other authors' stories. I'm giving away a digital copy of UNDER A WESTERN SKY today to a lucky commenter who answers this question: I'm very cold-natured and even with modern heating, in the winter, I'm still freezing! How would you have coped with an "old west" winter? Wrapped up in a quilt in front of the fire? Tried to "ignore" it? Tried to take your mind off of it somehow--maybe by knitting or cooking or something that would keep you from thinking of it? What would you have done?

FIRE EYES by Cheryl Pierson
Beaten and wounded by a band of sadistic renegades that rules the borderlands of Indian Territory, U.S. Marshal Kaed Turner understands what the inevitable outcome will be for him: death. But Fate and a war party of Choctaw Indians intervene, delivering him instead to a beautiful angel with the skill to heal him. Jessica Monroe has already lost a husband and a brother to these outlaws. Can she afford to gamble with her heart one last time?

ALL MY HOPES AND DREAMS by Celia Yeary
To escape an arranged marriage, beautiful, proper Cynthia Harrington impulsively marries Ricardo Romero, a sensual Spaniard who ranches on the edge of the Texas frontier. She struggles to gain a foothold in the hostile household, determined to make a place for herself—but will she also find a way to make her husband love her?

TEXAS GOLD by Tracy Garrett

Texas Ranger Jake McCain is hot on the trail of a band of murderous outlaws when they ambush him and leave him for dead in the blinding snow. The last thing Rachel Hudson expects the blizzard to bring is a wounded Ranger with a pack of trouble. She and Jake have more than a powerful mutual attraction in common—the dangerous gunmen he’s been chasing intend to steal Rachel and her brother, Nathan. But Jake’s not about to lose the woman who means everything to him—Rachel, his TEXAS GOLD…(Previously published as TOUCH OF TEXAS)

THE COMANCHERO’S BRIDE by Kaye Spencer
Beautiful heiress Elizabeth White is exiled to Texas until she agrees to marry the prominent politico her parents have chosen for her—Grayson Beal. When Elizabeth is approached at a fiesta by dark-eyed, handsome Mingo Valderas, her heart will never be her own again. But Mingo has a reputation as a Comanchero—a man who is as fast with his knives as he is with his gun. Still, Elizabeth gives her trust to him, and their whirlwind courtship begins. Beal will stop at nothing to claim Elizabeth—and only one man can protect her. Elizabeth and Mingo stay one step ahead of Beal…but will that be enough?

MARGARITA AND THE HIRED GUN by Patti Sherry-Crews

Pampered Margarita McIntosh is sent away by her father for her own safety—from what, she’s not sure. The long journey ahead and the secret she carries in her saddlebag could be the death of her. A rough Irish gunman, Rafferty, is entrusted with getting her to her destination—for a reward—his ticket to a new life. But will Rafferty’s protection be enough to save their lives? And will the heat of their passion seal their future—if they do survive?

XENIA’S RENEGADE by Agnes Alexander
An urgent plea for help from a family member calls for action from Xenia Poindexter and her sister. But traveling west to save their uncle, a raid on a stagecoach way station would have seen them dead if not for handsome half-Sioux rancher, Ty Eldridge. Ty wants to protect Xenia from her uncle’s schemes, but he’s been burned in the past by love. Though others say they’re all wrong for each other, Xenia has never felt more “right” than when she’s in Ty’s arms. Is true love worth the chance of becoming XENIA’S RENEGADE?

If you just can't wait to see if you won in the drawing, here's the buy link for UNDER A WESTERN SKY! At only .99, it's quite a bargain of wonderful reads to keep you warm on a winter's night!
https://www.amazon.com/Under-Western-Sky-Historical-Romance-ebook/dp/B078SGY1HW/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1517075801&sr=8-1&keywords=Under+a+Western+Sky

FIRST RIDE COWBOY COLLECTION: YOU NEVER FORGET YOUR FIRST

I'm doing a little something different this month for the blog. I usually don't like to advertise, but I'm so excited to be a part of this boxed set, I thought I'd give you a peek. There's something for everyone. Some historical...some contemporary...but all cowboys! Just in time for Valentine's Day this features the first in the series brought to you by eighteen authors. 

Check it out, and I'm giving away an e-copy to one person who comments! 

First Ride Cowboy Collection

You Never Forget Your First...

FEATURING:

Lacy Denvers has lost her job, and lost her way. All she wants to do now is get her career back on track and find some stability again, but first, she wants to mark something off her bucket list: She wants to learn to ride a horse. Her dream vacation to the Crawley Creek Cattle Ranch turns into a lesson in patience when the North Dakota winter proves unpredictable as ever. Wrapped in a cocoon of snow, Lacy finds the ranch to be a hidden treasure trove of cowboy eye candy, and her mouth is watering even as her brain is telling her to run.
After a devastating tragedy, a young Drannon Russo ended up fostering with the Crawley family, and found a home. He's only moved away once and had to lean on family for support when his dreams were shattered. Being a cowboy on a ranch is a pretty lonely existence. When a beautiful redhead shows up looking for a fresh start he's determined to give them both what they want.
Will this vacation into the heart of cattle country turn out to be a mistake, or will Lacy and Drannon find their future in each other?
www.LoriKingBooks.com

 

Five brides for five brothers...at least that's the deal the Daltons have struck with their boys. Each son must marry in order to inherit a piece of the ranch they love so much.
Hank Dalton yearns to run his own spread, but more than that, he longs for a woman to call his own. Paradise Valley is far from civilization, though, and that makes finding the perfect match difficult. Not many women like being two hours from a major supermarket or mall.
Charlotte is on the run. Poor choices have left her with scars - in and out. After her powerful boyfriend left her drugged and set their apartment on fire, she's just trying to put the pieces of her life back together. Abandoning all she knows seems like the best decision she's ever made. At least until her car breaks down in the middle of cattle country.
When a pretty little woman is delivered into Hank's hands, he believes it was fate that kept him from joining his brothers for a "wife hunt" in the city. But she's leery of men and hiding something dark. Can Hank tap into the attraction they both feel before she drives away?
www.empetrova.com

Jordan Hawthorne thought she had it all until a surprise for her fiance turns into losing everything that she ever wanted. She flees her home in Charlotte, North Carolina to take a new job in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains and make a new start where her ex-fiance can't find her. Jordan is just beginning to adjust to her new life in the middle of nowhere when a small town cowboy walks in and disrupts it all.
Tom McCloud never had time for a serious commitment, always too busy with running his grandparents' farm. Everything changes when he stumbles upon a broken-hearted city girl and a steamy buzz ignites between them. But what happens when the city girl can't stay hidden in the country for long?
www.jayceeford.com

Candace Marie Browne has been the head cook-hell, the only cook on the Crooked E ranch for the past three years. She's come to care for the owner Mr. Everson like a second father and the ranch hands like brothers...all except one. Mason Edwards, foreman on the Crooked E Ranch.
After walking in on her fiance and her best friend going at it on her new furniture she needed a break from men altogether. So like any mature woman...Candace moved out of her hometown of Helena, Montana and picked up the first waitress job she could find in Butte and didn't look back. That's where Hank Everson found her a few months later and offered her the job on the E.
Mason had noticed the beautiful redhead the moment she walked into the dining room at the E. But what really got him? Was when he saw the woman actually cringe at the dinner he had put on the table.
The long shiny auburn tresses, big brown puppy dog eyes, a body that was rounded in all the right areas. Oh yeah! He'd spent a lot of time thinking about his Candy Girl. Plus, the extra corn bread biscuits she snuck him every Friday after their weekly chili dinner didn't hurt either.
Yep, Mason had discovered Candace was...Sweet as Candy!
www.siddaleerain.com

Lazarus Graham has always been the black sheep of his family. Leaving behind the ranch his family had owned for nearly 200 years, he lives life as a Texas Ranger. Tough, hard and inflexible, he has no time for life's fripperies.
Beatrice Cartwright never expected to run into her childhood nemesis again. Yet Laz Graham sauntered into her store to investigate a crime nearby. Then the man had the nerve to not remember her.
Being a Graham isn't easy, and it's about to get a lot harder for one stubborn lawman and the woman who still owns his heart.
www.bethwilliamson.com

Can two people, one horse and the power of love cure a little girl?
Angela French blames herself for her daughter's lack of voice. Determined to do anything to correct the situation, she seeks out Jake Kyncade, the owner of The Heartsong Ranch.
Jake Kyncade hides his own sorrows behind his no-nonsense demeanor. Helping children becomes one way to correct his past. Using equine therapy, he sets out to make a difference.
Can Jake help Angela's dreams come true or will Jake's past bring more heartache? Will love save them all?
www.melissakeir.com

Pastry chef, Cary Crockett, is on the run. Pursued by a loan shark bent on retrieving gambling debts owed him by her deadbeat ex-boyfriend, she finds the perfect hiding place at the remote Circle W Ranch. More at home with city life, cupcakes and croissants than beef, beans and bacon, she has to convince ranch owner Micah West she's up to the job of feeding his hired hands. The overwhelming attraction she feels toward him was nowhere in the job description.
Micah West has a big problem. The camp-cook on his central Oregon ranch has up and quit without notice, and his crew of hungry cowboys is about to mutiny. He agrees to hire Cary on a temporary basis, just until he finds the right man to fill the job. Maintaining a hands-off policy toward his sexy new cook becomes tougher than managing a herd of disgruntled wranglers.
www.stephanieberget.com

L.A. cop Jordan Masters Ryan has a problem. Her normal method of meeting a crisis head-on and taking it down won't work. Not this time. Not when fate is her adversary. Having kept her from the man she thought she'd always marry, the same fickle fate took away the man she eventually did. Thrown back into the path of her first love, she finds hers is not the only heart fate has damaged.
Widower and software CEO, Cole McCall fills his days with computer codes and his free time working the family's cattle ranch. Blaming himself for his wife's death, he's become hard and bitter. When his visiting former neighbor sets out to delete the firewall around his heart, he discovers there's no protection against the Jordan virus. Though she understands his pain and reawakens his soul, will it be enough for Cole to overcome his past and embrace their fated hearts?
www.donnamichaelsauthor.com

All Madeline Harper ever wanted was to escape the tight fences of Black Mountain, Colorado. Nothing would stop her from pursuing her goals--not a devoted boyfriend, or infant son.
For the last five years Shan Ellis' life has consisted of being a dad. He scarified everything for his son. College. A career. Girls. Now, the one woman he can't forget is back in town.
Can they overcome the mistakes of the past and find love again?
https://www.facebook.com/DLindunAuthor

Widowed with two small children and a ranch to run, Mariella Swanson knows she needs help, but isn't sure her heart, or neighbors, will accept her marrying a stranger. When the greenhorn shows up, smoking a pipe and wearing a derby hat, she can't help but wonder if agreeing to this marriage may prove to be her biggest mistake.
When Davis Weston receives a letter from his sister asking him to marry a friend, he scoffs at the idea. However, losing his wife and son has left him a lonely man, and the whispers from others that he didn't do enough to save his family has gone on long enough. His arrival in Oregon may be worse - these neighbors are doing more than whispering. Guns and horses aren't his forte. He's willing to learn, but is he willing to love again?
Historical western filled with steamy romance and the rawness of a growing country.
www.patyjager.net
 

Mesa Arraguso writes about hot cowboys for a living. Being a romance writer has it perks and its drawbacks. She spends a lot of time alone in front of her computer, but she gets to fantasize about incredibly hot men wearing cowboy boots and Stetsons. While visiting San Antonio, Texas for a writer's conference, she finds herself stranded on the back roads of Bandera only to be rescued by one of the most gorgeous men she's ever encountered, be it fantasy or for real.
Joel Young is a cowboy. From the top of his Stetson to the tip of his dirty cowboy boots, he's cowboy through and through. Along with rescuing women when they do silly things like running out of gas miles from town on a dirt road, he spends his days herding cattle, fixing fences and breaking horses.
Can one handsome cowboy and a city-girl from LA find common ground is the Hill Country long enough to see beyond a quick fling?
www.romancestorytime.com

GySgt Jared Worrell wanted one thing - to live and die a Marine. He's made a good start at the first and come close to the second more times than a man should. One call from his mother changes all his plans, and he's headed back to Ten Sleep, Wyoming. The Reserves feed his need to be a Marine, but what does a man do the rest of the year in a town so small it doesn't even have one stoplight? His mom has the perfect solution; Jared should use another talent and become the town chocolatier. He's just recovering from that bomb when she drops another...
Lucy Thomas fell in love with Ten Sleep when her parents fulfilled their dreams of owning their own ranch. Now Lucy is living her dream of photographing Wyoming from its landscape to its people, but she's never really felt a part of the small town where everyone has known everyone else forever. Turning the doorknob to her friend's house brings her face to face with a man whose arms she'd love to call home. He's a Marine, cowboy, and chocolatier...how can a woman resist?
Coming home never tasted so sweet.
www.kirstenlynnwildwest.com

The morning after Amy Leigh Paisley, from Pine Oak, Montana is left behind in Las Vegas, she wakes up with not only a huge hangover, but with a husband who happens to be Trent Baxter, Billings' most eligible bachelor.
His father thinks she's a gold-digger, her mother wants her to be one and all Amy Leigh wants, is to stay married to the hot man for just a bit longer and maybe another night of great sex.
www.hildiemcqueen.com

Former professional poker player, Kendra "Night Owl" Lowe, is determined to make her new Poker Flat Nudist Resort successful, even if it means relying on her own two hands and a few misfit employees. All bets are off, however, when Wade Johnson arrives, her fourth stable manager in less than four months, and her attention wanders to his broad shoulders, six-pack abs, and polite ways. But she's his boss and giving in to temptation could mean jeopardizing her operation. Something she refuses to do.
Wade Johnson only agreed to work at Poker Flat because he owed his best friend a favor. Now he has to discover why the last three stable mangers quit and fulfill the requirements of his position, while trying to keep his hands off the smart, sexy, unreadable owner. But even as his body and heart become more involved, new "unfortunate events" occur to threaten the resort.
As Wade draws closer to learning the truth, his own truth is revealed. Kendra will do everything she can to make her resort a success, which could include letting him go. To win her heart and save her dream, he will have to go all-in and that could mean baring more than his soul.
www.lexipostbooks.com

River Prescott has everything she's ever wanted - except perhaps a man. The unconventional ranch owning artist is very certain she doesn't want a husband. But sometimes she can't help wishing for a lover; especially after her new neighbor trespasses and she gets a full-frontal view of his assets.
Edge Grayson moves onto the rundown spread he's inherited, expecting to stay aloof from nearby town business. But between local artist, River Prescott's determination to seduce him and protecting her from a killer on the prowl, the ex-gunslinger is finding respectability a lot more dangerous than his former life of sin.
www.gemsivad.com

The oldest of three sisters, Jewels Stone takes care of everyone, especially those she loves. When she finds out the youngest Stone is duped, she plans to rope and wrangle the cowboy to teach him a lesson on how to treat a woman.
Tied to a bedpost and as mad as a hornet, Spark Ryder wants to toss Jewels over his knee and spank her. Problem is, he'd enjoy it too much. Held hostage by rope and wax strips, he tries to convince her that she has the wrong cowboy. But how can he convince her that he's innocent when she's out to settle a score against all men?
While seeking revenge, Jewels finds a passion that'll have her hanging by a dream. The pressure is too much and loose threads holding the past begin to unravel. Her brain urges her to run while her heart wishes to stay.
Spark wants nothing but distance with Jewels, but when things start to heat up on the Rhinestone Ranch, he samples Jewels' treasure and finds himself on the wrong end of the rope again - but it's his soul that's bound to a woman who will never trust.
He wants to stitch her broken heart, but will he walk before his own heart is in need of mending?
www.rhondaleecarver.com

Jake Stone isn't happy about Hattie's granddaughter suddenly appearing to take over her ranch after Hattie's death, but he knows she'd want him to make her welcome. He just didn't expect to like the stubborn redhead quite so much. Becca Daniels has inherited a horse ranch from a grandmother she never knew. To sell it, she has to live on it for six months. Otherwise, it goes up for auction. Now it seems someone else wants it and is trying to run her off. Now, with her horses stolen, her home invaded, and threats made against her if she doesn't leave, Becca doesn't know where to put her trust. What sinister plot is underway to force her hand? Worst of all, could the gorgeous cowboy who's managed to steal her heart be behind it all?
www.susanfisherdavisauthor.weebly.com

When Crystal Wilson gets roped into a wild, girls-only weekend at a rowdy "stud" ranch, the last thing she wants to do is tangle with a bunch of half-naked men pretending to be cowboys. But when she meets Ford McCoy, she can't help but be attracted to his dark, dominant, gruff appeal.
What she doesn't know is that Ford isn't a stripper. He's her friend's overprotective brother, there to make sure his little sister doesn't get into any trouble. She's surprised at the passion that flares between them. In fact, what she has with Ford might just be what she's been looking for all along.
It's a pity the sexy rancher isn't in the market for a city girl.
www.sabrinayork.com

There's a cowboy for all seasons for sure and then some! Thanks for stopping by and we hope you'll take a look at the boxed set. It's only 99 cents for 18 Cowboys...I mean stories.

Go here for all buy links!

Kirsten Lynn is a Western and Military Historian. She worked six years with a Navy non-profit and continues to contract with the Marine Corps History Division for certain projects. Making her home where her roots were sewn in Wyoming, Kirsten also works as a local historian. She loves to use the history she has learned and add it to a great love story. She writes stories about men of uncommon valor…women with undaunted courage…love of unwavering devotion …and romance with unending sizzle. When she’s not writing, she finds inspiration in day trips through the Bighorn Mountains, binge reading and watching sappy old movies, or sappy new movies. Housework can always wait.