Another Palm Sunday Many Years Ago

   McLean House at Appomattox Court House, Virginia

Although a few skirmishes would follow, it was Palm Sunday, April 9, 1865 when the Civil War officially ended. Confederate General Robert E. Lee and Union General Ulysses Grant, who had known each other slightly during the Mexican-American War, gathered in the parlor in the McLean House in the village of Appomattox Court House. General Lee was accompanied by Lt. Col Charles Marshall Virginia and General Grant’s staff numbered about a dozen.

 

          Replica of table where Lee sat

Seated at two small tables, General Lee surrendered his Army of Northern Virginia to General Grant. General Grant wrote a letter detailing the terms of surrender, which were generous even by Lee’s account. Confederate soldiers would be required to lay down their arms and then be paroled and

        Replica of table where Grant sat

allowed to return home to their farms and businesses. Confederate officers would be allowed to keep their sidearms, pistols, and swords. The Confederates who had horses or other animals were allowed to keep them. These terms of surrender had emanated from a prior agreement between President Abraham Lincoln and General Grant. The President believed that the war that had cost the nation so much in lost and injured lives should end with as little animosity as possible. Those who had served in the Confederate Army should now be allowed to return home, pick up their lives, and begin the healing process.

               Lee & Grant at Appomattox                                by Stanley Arthurs 1922

 

Appomattox Courthouse remains a somewhat rural small village 24 miles east of Lynchburg and 95 miles west of Richmond. It has been preserved by the National Park Service and opened to the public on April 9th, 1949.  At the dedication ceremony on April 16, 1950, before an audience of around 20,000 people, Major General U.S. Grant and Robert E. Lee IV, direct descendants of Robert E. Lee and Ulysses Grant, cut the ceremonial ribbon.

My Work

Writer’s manuscripts are like children. We pour our time, love, faith, wisdom, imagination, discipline, and hope into them. We want to see them mature into a creation we can be proud of, and that others will benefit from and enjoy.

THE CAPTIVE HEART is a manuscript and STEWART’S GREEN is a work in progress.

  

 

She indentured herself and fled Scotland

on a ship to Virginia

to escape disgrace and start a new life,

only to find faith and a future she could never have anticipated.

 

Book One ~ A story of forgiveness

THE CAPTIVE HEART

Woman Colonial_Woman_Williamsburg_(4664967915)
photo courtesy of Colonial Williamsburg

 

In 1770, Heather Douglas, disillusioned and desperate to escape her native Scotland, signs a seven year indenture and flees aboard a British merchant vessel headed for the Virginia colony. When a common planter purchases Heather’s indenture and takes her to his farm, she is faced with new and constant challenges. It is in the Virginia countryside that Heather begins her greatest journey, one of self discovery and of maturing faith. Here, she discovers that her emotional and spiritual scars bind her far more than her indenture.

Matthew Stewart, a widowed farmer with two young children, needed someone to help raise them. Was God leading him to take this unknown indentured servant as his wife? How would these two individuals, from opposite sides of the Atlantic, and each having experienced their own tragedies, bridge their differences to make a life together?

 

A tender, heartfelt novel about new beginnings and love blooming in unexpected places. The Captive Heart weaves rich history and romance together into a beautiful tapestry of faith sure to find a special place in readers’ hearts.                                            Laura Frantz, author of Love’s Reckoning and Love’s Awakening

 

 Life was better than she dreamed,

now the conflict between the

British and the colonists

threatened the loss of everything dear,

even her husband.

 

Book Two ~ A story of faithfulness

 

Stewart's Green 

STEWART’S GREEN

 

It was spring of 1775 and the antagonism between the colonists and the British had escalated to direct confrontation. Throughout Virginia, as well as at the Stewart’s ordinary in the Virginia countryside, strife between factions loyal to the crown and those demanding independence was pitting friends, neighbors and families against each other. Like so many others in this newly birthed nation, Heather and Matthew Stewart’s world was turning upside down. Loyalties are questioned and when Matthew disappears, odd and confusing events create doubts and suspicion. The inevitable war will challenge the family’s faith, alter relationships, and change their lives forever.