What? Another Civil War Book?

Yes. But this collection is different enough to capture a whole new generation of Civil War historians and turn them into keepers of the flame.

The working title was: Huckleberry Finn gets sucked up into the Civil War. Like Huck, Hunter Jones is a precocious, wily pre-teen who gets in and out of trouble as easily as Mark Twin’s Huckleberry Finn did.

The story opens as Hunter Jones watches his dad get killed by a silky riverboat gambler, as they get ready to switch boats at Des Arc Arkansas, trying to escape up the White River to Batesville Arkansas, then onto St. Louis Missouri and the safety of the north, just as the Civil War is about to erupt.

As an indigent with no means of support, he is tossed off the boat, chased by an alcoholic town sheriff and forced to hide in the woods, surviving the best he can, until he gets shot and captured by soldiers from the newly formed Confederate Army.

General Thompson tells him, “If you are going to eat my beans, you are going to fight my war.” With that Hunter becomes a non-combatant in the new Confederate Army – a drummer and step-and-fetch-it for the general. It’s in that role where he gets kicked in the head by a mule and goes into a coma. Two old crusty veterans of the Crimean and Mexican Wars befriend him. Believing that Hunter can hear even though he doesn’t respond, they read to him daily from old copies of battlefield newspapers.

With his fertile imagination Hunter dreams he is living the events that are being read to him. Even though he and his story are fictional, the sad details, facts, figures and events of the Civil War are historically correct. Through his eyes the reader visits and experiences many "first" that changed or altered the direction of the Civil War, West of the Mississippi – the first battle of the war, the first General to die, the first use of instant messaging (telegraph) in a war, the first use of metal hulled ships (ironsides), the first battle Ulysses S. Grant fought (and lost?), plus other first and events: The Capture of Camp Jackson, The St. Louis Massacre, The Boonville Races, the rout of the Union forces at Carthage and Wilson's Creek Missouri.

To order a copy, click on "From: Amazon.com" in the left column. And thank you for even considering it. Signed Jinx

A TRILOGY...

“Hunter Jones Joins the Civil War – Missouri” is the first in a trilogy, a series that is different enough to capture the imaginations of the next generation of Civil War historians, the future keepers of the flame.

The next in the series was Hunter Jones in Indian Territory. It explains how the Indians got to Indian Territory and why some fought for the North and some fought for the South. It also covers some of the battles that happened in the New Mexico Territory, before it became Arizona and New Mexico, including Stanwix Station (AZ), the western most battle of the Civil War. And how Texan Confederates planned to go up through the New Mexico Territory and capture the gold mines in Colorado to help pay for the South's war effort.

The third book in the trilogy is Hunter Jones in Arkansas. It deals with many of the Civil War events that happened in the state of Arkansas - the battles at: Pea Ridge, Prairie Grove, Devil's Backbone, Chalk Bluff, Poison Spring (et al) including the blowing up of The Mound City an ironsides at Saint Charles Arkansas and ending with the last battle of the Civil War at Brownsville Texas across the Rio Grande from Matamoros, Mexico and the last General (Chief Stand Watie) to surrender two months after the surrender at Appomattox.

Hopefully teachers who want to teach more about Civil War history can turn to this book to help their students learn about a piece of our history. - Signed Jinx (Julian) Olson

_____________

"Marriage, Divorce and the Soul Mates Left Behind", a self-help book for Soul Mates Left Behind, was my first published book. It tells how to survive a broken heart after a sad divorce. Please click on: "Soul Mates Defined" in the column to the left to lean more about "Marriage, Divorce and the Soul Mates Left Behind". - Signed Jinx (Julian) Olson