Volcano House: Sharing Aloha on a Crater’s Rim

Cozy mystery author Janet Oakley recounts the fascinating history of how Volcano House Hotel near Kīlauea Crater’s rim came to be.

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Janet Oakley author photoRelevant History welcomes back historical fiction author Janet Oakley, a history nerd and amateur gardener. Her fiction spans the mid-19th century to WW II with characters standing up for something in their own time and place. Her writing has been recognized with a 2013 Bellingham Mayor’s Arts Award, the Chanticleer Grand Prize for Tree Soldier, Goethe Grand Prize for The Jøssing Affair, 2018 Will Rogers Silver Medallion and 2018 WILLA Silver Awards for Mist-chi-mas: A Novel of Captivity. Timber Rose was a 2015 WILLA Award finalist. A UH Manoa grad, she has special memories of the 1877 Volcano House, often teaching there. To learn more about Janet and her books, visit her web site, and follow her on Facebook and Twitter.

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The island of Oahu has Diamond Head. Maui has Haleakala. But neither of these compare to the Big Island of Hawai’i’s active volcano at Kīlauea. Sacred to the Hawaiian goddess, Pele, and the darling of volcanologists worldwide, Kīlauea captured the imaginations of Europeans from their very first visit in the late 1790s. Soon, travelers from all over the world began to show up to see its “lava lakes.”

Early tourists on Kīlauea Crater’s rim
Volcano House Register Hikers 1890In 1823, Reverend William Ellis, an Englishman, made such a visit with American missionary, Asa Thurston. It was arduous journey of nearly twenty miles starting down by the ocean, crossing a lava desert and eventually arriving at the north end of Kilauea Crater. Ellis wrote, “We stopped and trembled.” He then went on to describe Kīlauea:

Immediately before us yawned an immense gulf, in the form of a crescent, about two miles in length, from north-east to south-west, nearly a mile in width, and apparently 800 feet deep. The bottom was covered with lava.

On the north rim of the crater, their Hawaiian guides set up a hut for the night made of “a few green branches of trees, some fern leaves and rushes…” This was most likely one of the first tourist lodgings for travelers.

The 1840s brought both sightseers and explorers to Kīlauea. Between December 1840 and January 1841, the US Exploring Expedition, led by Lt. Charles Wilkes, visited Kīlauea while doing a survey trip to the summit of Mauna Loa. With steady arrivals to the rim, a Hawaiian is said to have set up hut where he sold food to visitors. In 1846 Benjamin Pitman from Salem, Massachusetts, erected a one room grass shelter at the crater’s rim. For a dollar a day a visitor could sleep on a mat floor. He soon gave up the enterprise, but he left a name for the structure—Volcano House.

Volcano House 1866 NPS Hawai'i Volcanoes National ParkIn 1866, George W.C. Jones of Keauhou, Hawaii, who had made his fortune in pulu (a popular soft fiber from the hapu’u fern and used for upholstery stuffing), went in partnership with Charles and Jules Richardson to build a more substantial wood structure. Overlooking Kilauea Crater, the building had a pili thatch roof with four bedrooms, parlor, and dining room inside. Mark Twain came for a visit in 1866 and wrote about Volcano House in Roughing It:

Neat, roomy, well-furnished and a well-kept hotel. The surprise of finding a good hotel at such an outlandish spot startled me, considerably more than the volcano did.

Six years later, another famous personage visited Volcano House. Englishwomen Isabella Bird was already well known as a travel writer and explorer when she arrived on the Big Island in 1872 to climb Mauna Loa. She later wrote of arriving at Volcano House in the dark:

Rarely was light more welcome than that which twinkled from under the verandah of the lonely crater house into the rainy night. The hospitable landlord of this unique dwelling lifted me from my horse, and carried me into a pleasant room thoroughly warmed by a large wood fire…

A new building, more visitors
By 1877, Volcano House was overflowing with visitors who came to watch Kīlauea’s live eruptions and lava lakes from the inn’s porch. It was time to build a larger, more comfortable Volcano House Hotel. The three partners hired architect Willian Lentz to accomplish this. Lentz’s design was the first Western-styled structure in Volcano. Doors, windows and building materials were brought from the coast of Keauhou on horseback and two-wheeled carts. The rafters, posts and studs for the hotel were hand hewn from native ‘ohi‘a and naio (false sandalwood) hardwood. This new inn boasted a central main room with fireplace, six guest rooms to the right of it, and a parlor and manager’s quarters to the left. Colonel John Henry and Emma Maby were hired to run it. A travel writer from San Francisco in 1880 glowed about the rooms and bed being “scrupulously clean…and the fare of excellent variety…”

In 1889, Robert Louis Stevenson visited the Big Island, but did not go up due to his health.

In 1893, Volcano House went under another remodel. A two-story addition of fourteen rooms was added onto the left end of the original structure, becoming the main part of the hotel. An observation tower and a larger dining hall were also added. The main room of the 1877 structure was now the “parlor.”

A new life and purpose
1907 Postcard of VH showing the 2 story addition from 1891Over the decades, Volcano House changed owners several times. When the Inter-Island Steam Navigation Company took over in in 1921, a new two-story wing was built, bringing the number of rooms to 115. Sadly, the 1877 structure was sawn apart and moved to a new location away from the cliff. There it served as quarters for the hotel employees and sometimes furniture storage. In 1940, it briefly functioned as an interim lobby and bar when the 1921 Volcano House burned down. It began to fall into disrepair after today’s present hotel was built.

In 1971, nearly 100 years after it was constructed, a local photographer and architect student rented the deserted 1877 building for a wilderness photography class. The classes were so successful that the photographer approached the Park Superintendent with the idea of using the building on a permanent basis. Volcano residents interested in the arts joined in.

In 1974, permission was granted. Now listed on the National Register as Hawai’i’s oldest visitor accommodation, the 1877 Volcano House displays the works of three hundred Hawai’i artists and presents cultural programs as the Volcano Art Center. From a grass hut in the 1840s during the time of the Royal Hawaiian Kingdom through territory and statehood and its latest manifestation, Volcano House has always brought aloha to visitors coming to stand in awe of nature on the rim of the world’s most accessible volcano, Kīlauea.

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Volcano House book coverA big thanks to Janet Oakley! She’ll give away one ebook copy of her cozy mystery, Volcano House, to one person who contributes a comment on my blog this week. I’ll choose the winner from among those who comment by Friday at 6 p.m. ET. Delivery is available worldwide.

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A Day in the Life of Puduhepa, Queen of the Hittites

Historical fantasy author Judith Starkston describes a day in the life of Puduhepa, Queen of the Hittites.

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Judith Starkston author photoRelevant History welcomes back Judith Starkston, author of the award-winning historical fantasy Priestess of Ishana and the Trojan War novel Hand of Fire. She has degrees in Classics from the University of California, Santa Cruz and Cornell. Priestess of Ishana combines history with magical elements found in Hittite rites, and in the series, Queen Puduhepa is renamed Tesha after the Hittite word for “dream.” (Read the post to find out why.) To learn more about Judith and her books, visit her web site, follow her on Facebook and Twitter—and sign up for her newsletter to receive a free Bronze Age short story and cookbook.

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Treaty of Qadesh between Egypt and Hittites, Giovanni Dall'Orto WikiMedia CommonsQueen Puduhepa pressed her seal into the first extant peace treaty in history. The Treaty of Kadesh was between her kingdom of the Hittites (in what is now Turkey) and Rameses II, Pharaoh of Egypt, during the Late Bronze Age, in the thirteenth century BCE. In the twentieth century, her letters, treaties, religious codifications and judicial decrees came to light when archaeologists dug up the great cuneiform libraries of her capital, Hattusha.

She reigned for some seventy years. At about fifteen she married Hattusili, who later became the Great King of the Hittites and she the queen. In the years following her reign, unknown forces destroyed and buried the Hittite Empire, and this remarkable queen was forgotten to history. From clay tablets, now deciphered and translated, we can reconstruct some of the typical events from a day in the life of Puduhepa.

Even the water matters
As Puduhepa’s hypothetical day begins, she reaches for that first cup of water to quench her morning thirst. From one of the tablets, we have instructions to palace personnel about the royal water:

All the kitchen personnel—the cupbearer, the table-man, the cook, the baker, the dairy man (the list goes on) you will have to swear an oath… Fill a bitumen cup with water and pour it out toward the Sun-god and speak as follows: “Whoever does something in an unclean way and offers to the king (or queen) polluted water, pour you, O gods, that man’s soul out like water!”

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You who are water carriers, be very careful with water! Strain the water with a strainer! At some time I, the king, found a hair in the water pitcher in Sanahuitta. I expressed my anger to the water carriers “This is scandalous. … If he is found guilty, he shall be killed!”

According to the Hittites, a hair could be used to place a curse on the king or queen. Just slip the correct hair in with the proper incantations, and you could shorten the king’s life, cause him a wasting illness, or any number of other mysterious problems. Curses were a regular concern—which explains the stiff penalty in this case, although ritual purity in general for the royal family was a tremendous concern for reasons of proper relationship and harmony with the gods rather than notions of healthfulness.

Setting things right with the gods
Once Puduhepa refreshes herself with water free from any curses, she might prepare herself to go to the temple to make offerings and pray. Puduhepa’s love and devotion for her husband were legendary. They met accidentally—except they both attributed it to their patron goddess Ishtar—and it was love at first sight. In a dream, Ishtar commanded Hattusili to marry Puduhepa. Puduhepa also had dreams from Ishtar regularly, and these two mystics, who led extremely pragmatic lives, found great solace in each other. When Hattusili was ill, as he often was both with a mysterious eye ailment and something painful in his feet, Puduhepa prayed fervently for his health.

In the inner sanctum of the temple where only the royal family and the priests were allowed access, Pudhepa makes offerings to the divine statues of the gods. Each day priests and priestess provided food and drink for and bathed and dressed their gods. In this brightly frescoed space, before gold and silver statues draped in finery, Puduhepa offers a goat or bull for sacrifice. She has selected bread offerings from a myriad of shapes—today perhaps a hand or bird—and her breads are sweetened with honey and soaked in olive oil.

To ensure her husband’s health, she beseeches the gods to bring Hattusili long life and well-being. In one of her extant prayers, she opens by reminding the Sun-goddess Arinna that Hattusili had recaptured the goddess’s sacred city of Nerik, and the traditional offerings to her are once again being made there. After this reminder of the goddess’s debt to Hattusili, Puduhepa goes on to make this plea:

Since I, Puduhepa, am a woman of the birthstool (a midwife or possibly a mother of many children), … have pity on me, O Sun-goddess of Arinna, my lady, and grant me what I ask of you! Grant life to Hattusili, your servant! Through the Fate-goddesses and the Mother-goddesses may long years, days and strength be granted to him.

Later in the same prayer, now directed to one of Arinna’s attending goddesses, Puduhepa suggests that maybe someone has made an offering to the gods to damage Hattusili or has otherwise cursed him, and that this goddess should undo that harm. In return Puduhepa will give her a life-sized silver statue of Hattusili with golden head, hands and feet. That’s a lot of wifely devotion and an interesting window into how the Hittite queen viewed her relationship with the gods. The queen wasn’t afraid to resort to divine bribery.

Counselor, priestess, judge and diplomat
Next in her day she could select from a wide range of activities we know she engaged in. She served as her husband’s primary source of counsel, as a priestess of Ishtar, as supreme court judge for the Hittite Kingdom, as an astute political negotiator, and as a marriage broker (a form of diplomacy) between great rulers such as Rameses and her husband’s many children (by concubines as well as Puduhepa’s own).

Finally some food
At the end of her busy day she had a supper of lamb roasted in cumin and garlic with a side dish of lentils and leeks. Some cucumber in yogurt cooled her tongue. Perhaps servants laid out the exotic, imported treat of dates on a silver tray for her enjoyment. More likely the finishing sweet came in the form of dried figs and apricots. She might even have drunk her beer through a straw, which as near as we can tell was a filter to keep the bits of grain out of one’s mouth.

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Judith Starkston book coverA big thanks to Judith Starkston! She’ll give away an ebook copy of Priestess of Ishana to two people who contribute a comment on my blog this week. I’ll choose the winners from among those who comment by Friday at 6 p.m. ET. Delivery is available worldwide.

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Pioneer in the Fast Lane

Historical fiction author Anne Lovett highlights the demanding career of pioneer photographer Margaret Bourke-White.

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Anne Lovett author photoRelevant History welcomes back Anne Lovett, author of Rubies from Burma, named one of the best 100 Indie books of 2017 by Kirkus Reviews, and Maggie Award of Excellence finalist Saving Miss Lillian. With degrees from Emory University and Georgia Tech, she is the mother of three mostly adult children and lives in Atlanta with her model-railroader husband. The River Nymph is her latest release. To learn more about her and her books, visit her web site, and follow her on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest.

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In The River Nymph, released 15 July 2019, Augusta Pemberton idolizes Margaret Bourke-White and wants to follow in her adventurous footsteps. I’ll confess to a bit of artistic license in my novel for the sake of the story.

Margaret Bourke-WhiteBorn in 1904 Cleveland to second-generation immigrants, her father of Polish descent and her mother of Irish, Margaret White—called Maggie by her family—really didn’t begin her career until 1927. She studied at the Clarence H. White School of Photography but also spent time at four different universities.

She studied life sciences and design, unable to decide on a career, before finally graduating from Cornell. Unable to find a job in Ithaca, she thought of earning money by photographing the school. Her success and pleasure in selling that work made the career decision for her.

Leaving an unfortunate marriage, she returned to Cleveland and changed her name to include her mother’s surname, Bourke. Then she opened a studio where, over male objections, she pursued industrial photography. She had memories of her late father, an inventor, taking her into the mills when she was a child. At that impressionable age, she thought the metal glowing and the sparks flying were “the beginning and the end of all beauty.”

In Cleveland she visited the Otis Steel Mills and was allowed to photograph there despite the protests of men, who thought women were too delicate for that kind of work. She shrugged and invented a new kind of magnesium flare in order to capture the fiery operations inside, as black-and-white film of the day was unable to distinguish red from black. She made strides in architectural photography as well. Her courage and determination led her to ascend tall buildings and perch on precarious ledges in order to capture the images she desired.

Henry Luce, magazine magnate, noted her amazing work, and hired her as a staff photographer for Fortune in 1929. When Luce decided the public needed a magazine devoted to photography, Life was born, and Margaret was hired on staff. Her photograph of Montana’s Fort Peck Dam, resembling an Art Deco version of medieval ramparts, appeared on the cover of Life’s first issue.

You Have Seen Their Faces book coverAfter an assignment for Life in Russia, she became interested in the lives of workers and in social conditions. As the Depression sank into the nation, she teamed with Georgia native Erskine Caldwell for a book, You Have Seen Their Faces.

Caldwell was not enthused about working with a woman and quarreled with her, but during the trip they overcame their differences and fell in love. They were married later, but Erskine wanted her to stay home like a good Southern wife. Staying home when she could be out with her camera? That was not Maggie’s way. The marriage fell apart.

Margaret Bourke-White went on to have a storied career, becoming the first female war photographer during World War II, and later capturing images of the great and powerful as well as the meek and lowly. A pioneer in photojournalism and the photoessay, she was widely honored for her work. She was inducted into the National Women’s Hall of Fame in 1990.

In 1953, she was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease. Forced by her illness to resign from Life in 1957, she spent time writing essays, lecturing, and writing her biography, A Portrait of Myself, and went on to publish eleven books. She died in 1971, aged 67.

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The River Nymph book coverA big thanks to Anne Lovett! She’ll give away one paperback copy and one Kindle ebook copy of The River Nymph to two people who contribute a comment on my blog this week. I’ll choose the winners from among those who comment by Friday at 6 p.m. ET. For the paperback, delivery is available in the U.S. only. Delivery is available worldwide for the electronic copy.

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Redefining Historic Monuments as Artifacts: a Case for Adding Context

Historical fiction author Karen A. Chase makes a case for redefining historic monuments as artifacts and letting them stand.

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Karen Chase author photoRelevant History welcomes Karen A. Chase, an author and photographer, and a Daughter of the American Revolution with the Commonwealth Chapter in Virginia. Her first novel, Carrying Independence, is historical fiction about the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Karen will be a Virginia Foundation for the Humanities fellow for the 2019-2020 academic year, with full residency at the Library of Virginia. Originally from Calgary, Alberta, Canada, she is now chasing histories from Richmond, VA. To learn more about her and her books, visit her web site, and follow her on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, and Goodreads.

Update 22 August 2019: Virginia Humanities has awarded Karen A. Chase a fellowship at the Library of Virginia this fall so she can work on her book project “Eliza! Eliza!: Two 18th-Century Women Who Helped Found and Expand America.” Congratulations, Karen!

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Today the populace tore down a statue. When the soldiers heard what their leader had done to his people—his citizens he was supposed to protect—the men lashed ropes to that big lead statue, pulled it to the ground, and hacked it to pieces.

Pulling Down the Statue of King George III N.Y.C. by Johannes Adam Simon Oertel, 1859This might have been the news report from this day, 9 July, back in 1776. Soldiers of the Continental Army had gathered in Bowling Green, New York, at the feet of a statue of King George III. It had been erected just six years earlier by a populace grateful that the King had repealed the Townsend Acts. But on this day the Declaration of Independence was read aloud. The list of grievances cited against their King was long—27 points outlining an apathetic and self-appointed despot “unfit to be a ruler of a free people.”

Was it only right that early Americans rallied and destroyed the statue? It was a metaphorical and befitting end to a symbol of injustice, inequality, and entitlement.

I argue that it wasn’t just a monument. It was an artifact. Its destruction was a loss to historians, and moreover a missed opportunity to educate the populace—and us today—by adding context.

Studying art forms expands our understanding of history
Thomas Paine wrote, “The mind once enlightened cannot again become dark.” Studying the art of a time period, much like an era’s architecture or writings, illuminates previous human thought, assumptions, and actions.

This is also what artifacts do. Merriam-Webster defines an artifact as, “something characteristic of or resulting from a particular human institution, period, trend, or individual.”

When the nation abolished slavery, we did not burn Jefferson’s papers that contained notes on his slaves, or raze the slave dwellings at Monticello. Instead, historians and educators examined Jefferson’s writings and the buildings, weighing them against the writings of former slaves and the realities of human suffering resulting from Jefferson’s inability to affect a fully inclusive definition of equality. In so doing, we’ve come to learn about our collective humanity. The horrors and faults. The resilience and enlightenment.

If what has previously been defined as a “monument” is now an “artifact,” by definition we remove it from atop the pedestal and examine it differently. But words are not enough. We also need to visually place newer artifacts alongside them that show context.

The Virginia capitol is leading in the example of adding context
When Mark Warner became governor of Virginia, he was touring the grounds of the Richmond-based capitol with his family. Upon seeing all the statues of the founding fathers of Virginia lining a massive wedding-cake-style monument at the entrance, his daughter, so the story goes, asked him, “Where are all the women?”

That comment sparked a series of commissions over several years to create new, equally impressive works showcasing Virginia’s historic reality. When children in Richmond walk the grounds now, they’ll still see those founders, but marching toward them, hand raised, is Barbara Rose Johns—Richmond’s Rosa Parks—as part of the Capitol Square Civil Rights Memorial.

After careful study, and input from a broad and inclusive commission, a Native American tribute, “Mantle,” is now nestled into the historic landscape on the southwestern lawn. It is a place for reflection, representative of all Virginia’s nations, and indicative of their history and connection with the natural world.

The Womens Monument—Voices from the Garden—at the Virginia capitol with the founding mens original statues in the backgroundCurrently being developed is also “Voices from the Garden,” the Virginia Women’s Monument. Twelve women from various periods, locations, and ethnicities are being sculpted and cast in bronze to grace an oval space to honor their achievements. Yes, Martha Washington is there, but she’ll sit alongside educator Virginia E. Randolph, and the Pamunkey Chief, Cockacoeske. The bios of all the women are on the website, and the formal dedication will come in October of this year.

The result of adding context
The result of reconsidering statues as artifacts, and adding context, does more than merely provide funding and projects for modern artists. It educates. An educated populace is a citizenry that grows up to include, contribute, and participate.

Even Thomas Jefferson wrote to Dupont de Nemours in 1816, “Enlighten the people generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like evil spirits at the dawn of day.”

For this reason alone, we should not hide or destroy our history. We need artifacts, comparisons, context, and in so doing we shall become better educated. Only then can you, and historians like me, bear witness to a broader narrative and to a truer historical understanding.

Are the sculptures we’re creating for the Virginia capitol grounds enough to heal some of the divisiveness still present about other monuments in our southern city? No. But I think of them much as I regard historical documents like the Declaration of Independence. They are a lovely beginning.

They, like that document drafted in 1776, is a promise to expand our consciousness, to listen to other voices not always our own. It is a promise to strive to be better. And that is far stronger than any monument of bronze or lead.

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Carrying Independence book coverA big thanks to Karen A. Chase! She’ll give away a paperback copy of Carrying Independence to two readers who contribute comments on my blog. I’ll choose the winners from among those who comment by Friday at 6 p.m. ET. Delivery is available in the United States and Canada.

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The British Woman Who Fought and Died in the Spanish Civil War

Historical mystery author Kathleen Heady discusses the Spanish Civil War, which claimed the lives of volunteer fighters from all over the world, including gifted British artist Felicia Browne.

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Kathleen Heady author photoRelevant History welcomes Kathleen Heady, author of three mystery novels featuring Nara Blake, a woman from a Caribbean island who moves to England. Kathleen’s work in progress takes Nara to Spain, where she learns about Felicia Browne, a British woman who died fighting Fascists in the Spanish Civil War. Kathleen lives in North Carolina with her husband and two cats. Her house looks out on Carolina woods, almost fulfilling her childhood dream of living in a tree house. To learn more about her and her books, visit her web site, and follow her on Facebook and Goodreads.

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My second novel, Lydia’s Story, tells the story of a young British woman who becomes a spy during World War II. Although a wife and mother herself, she risks her life to travel behind German lines in France to bring Jewish children across the Pyrenees Mountains into the relative safety of neutral Spain.

Spanish Civil WarAs I began research for my current work in progress, I felt drawn to that beautiful part of the world that straddles France and Spain, and the time period leading up to World War II. I looked for a connection between Britain, Spain, and the art world. This led me to discover the story of a woman named Felicia Browne, the first British volunteer and only British woman to die in the Spanish Civil War.

A gifted and trained artist, Felicia Browne traveled to Berlin in 1928 to study metalwork. She had a chance to witness events in Germany in the late 1920s, and as a result became extremely anti-fascist. From that point on, she devoted her life to political activism, putting her art on a back burner. She traveled through Europe, aided by her ability to speak four languages, and often earned money by sketching portraits of villagers in remote areas she visited. Browne returned to England in the early 1930s, but her interest and her heart remained with the people of Europe who were struggling under increasingly repressive governments.

In 1936, she and a friend set out on a driving trip across France to Barcelona, where they planned to attend the People’s Olympiad, which was the socialist response to the Olympic Games being held in Berlin that summer. But these games turned out to be the “Olympics That Never Happened,” as the Spanish Civil War broke out, plunging Barcelona into violence.

Browne argued her way into the PSUC (Catalan Communist) Karl Marx Militia to fight against the Fascist forces. The leaders were strongly against a woman joining their fighting force, but she convinced them to give her a chance, stating that she could fight as well as any men. The leaders relented, and she set out with a band of militia members who were determined to dynamite a Fascist munitions train.

On 25 August 1936, near the Spanish town of Tardienta, in Aragon, Felicia Browne’s raiding party was ambushed. She was shot dead as she attempted to pull a wounded Italian comrade to safety. Due to the heavy gunfire, the other members of the raiding party were unable to retrieve her body or that of the comrade she was trying to rescue.

They did, however, retrieve one of her notebooks. Eventually the notebook was sold by the International Artists Association, and the proceeds were used to raise money for Spanish relief.

Francisco FrancoThe period of the Spanish Civil War is one that is still difficult to understand. It was a tragedy for the Spanish people and many others who volunteered to help the Spanish fight for freedom from fascism. The period included the tragic bombing of Guernica, immortalized in Pablo Picasso’s moving painting which hangs in the Museo Reina Sofia in Madrid. General Francisco Franco, who led the military coup against the elected republican government, eventually won the conflict and remained in power as a dictator until his death in 1975.

It is unknown exactly how many people, Spaniards as well as volunteer fighters from many countries around the world, including the Lincoln Brigade from the US, lost their lives in this senseless war. Felicia Browne was only one, but one who deserves to be remembered. Here’s an exhibit of her work held at the Tate Museum in London.

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Lydia's Story book coverA big thanks to Kathleen Heady! She will give away a paperback copy of Lydia’s Story to two readers who contribute comments on my blog. I’ll choose the winners from among those who comment by Friday at 6 p.m. ET. Delivery is available worldwide.

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The Million Dollar American Princesses

Historical mystery author Clara McKenna describes the lot of America’s richest Gilded-Age heiress, Consuelo Vanderbilt, who traded her large dowry for an English title.

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Clara McKenna author photoRelevant History welcomes Clara McKenna, who writes the new historical cozy Stella & Lyndy Mysteries series about an unlikely couple who mix love, murder, and horseracing in Edwardian England. She is a member of Sisters in Crime and the founding member of Sleuths in Time, a cooperative group of historical mystery writers who encourage and promote each other’s work. With an incurable case of wanderlust, she travels every chance she gets, England being a favorite destination. When she can’t get to England, she happily writes about it from her home in Iowa. To learn more about her and her books, vist her web site, and follow her on Facebook, Instagram, and Goodreads.

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Consider how lucky you would be if a hundred years ago your grandfather immigrated to America with nothing more than a few pennies in his pocket, worked hard, invested well—and now you are heir to one of the largest fortunes in the country. In America of today, every opportunity for “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” would be at your fingertips.

Not so for the nouveaux-riches of America during the Victorian and Edwardian eras. For decades, New York City was the epicenter of American high society, and New York’s society was controlled by a select few of ruling establishment, with Mrs. Caroline Astor at the helm. Thus, despite a family’s fortune, it was the opinion of these “Knickerbocker” families that mattered.

If Mrs. Astor spoke to you, your family might be allowed to enjoy the opera at the New York Academy of Music from the comfort of a box. If Mrs. Astor snubbed you, you’d find yourself quite lonely during promenades in the park. As Gail MacColl and Carol McD. Wallace write in To Marry an English Lord: Tales of Wealth and Marriage, Sex and Snobbery (2012), “…the crucial question was whether or not Mrs. Astor ‘knew’ you. Had she spoken to you at a tea party…had she invited you to her annual ball? If not, you’d best leave town or sit at home in the dark lest anyone know of your shame.”

So, what was an American heiress to do if her family was considered unworthy of a call from Mrs. Caroline Astor? She and her family applied the same “can do” spirit and entrepreneurial know-how they used to acquire their vast wealth and devised a way around these social constraints. For over forty years, starting just after the Civil War, hundreds of daughters of America’s most-wealthy found their way across the Atlantic to England and into the parlors and ballrooms of some of Britain’s most influential and powerful aristocratic families.

With large crumbling country estates, decreasing revenues, and pressures to maintain a lifestyle no longer fiscally possibly, a money-strapped British aristocracy in desperate need of an infusion of funds welcomed these women in a way that hadn’t happened in New York. To satisfy both the nobles’ need for cash and the Americans’ need to solidify their social standing back home, over a hundred “Million Dollar Princesses”—daughters of bankers, industrialists and railroad barons, including a Colgate, Fish, Goelet, Gould, Jerome, Vanderbilt and Whitney—exchanged dollars for titles, by marrying into the highest levels of British society.

Cartoon by Charles Dana Gibson spoofing the Consuelo Vanderbilt/Duke of Marlborough weddingSome did so willingly; some were not given a choice. America’s richest heiress, Consuelo Vanderbilt, was a spectacular example of the latter. In love with another man, she was bullied relentlessly by her mother until she agreed to marry the Duke of Marlborough. Consuelo was thought to have been heard weeping beneath her wedding veil during the ceremony. She divorced the Duke in 1920.

How ever they landed into the British aristocracy, these American women left Lady Nancy, Viscountess Astor, the first woman to serve in Parliamentan indelible mark. Nancy Langhorne Astor, of Virginia, became the first woman to sit as a Member of Parliament. Jennie Jerome Spencer-Churchill, of New York, is best known as Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s mother. Francis Work Burke Roche of Ohio’s great-great-grandson, Prince William, will one day sit on the throne of England. So as even as Downton Abbey, the highly acclaimed television series, was inspired by these pioneering, unforgettable American women, so should we all be.

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Murder At Morrington Hall book coverA big thanks to Clara McKenna! She will give away one hardback copy of Murder at Morrington Hall to a reader who contributes a comment on my blog. I’ll choose the winner from among those who comment by Friday at 6 p.m. ET. Delivery is available in the U.S. only.

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Killer Debt Nominated for Daphne du Maurier Award

180214KillerDebtEbookCover200x300I’m delighted to announce that Killer Debt, book #4 of my Michael Stoddard American Revolution Mystery series, has been nominated for the prestigious Daphne du Maurier Award for Excellence in Mystery/Suspense. To grab a nomination, Killer Debt had to be a better read than several dozen competing books in the historical crime fiction category and receive well over 80 out of a possible 88 points on the judges’ scorecards.

The lady who phoned me to convey the good news was one of the judges who’d read Killer Debt. She said it was the best mystery she’d read in years. She loved what I’d done with the history, with making a redcoat the hero and building so many layers of complexity into his life. She also loved the facts that although it’s a mid-series book, I made it high-stakes and essentially standalone. “You have a new fan!” she proclaimed.

The Daphne Award gives a shout-out to my book’s editor. Without his piercing insight for the past 15 or so years, my books would be “almost there.” And the nomination process gives equal weight to all entries, regardless of the publishing route. If you aren’t traditionally published, the award provides wonderful industry validation for your work.

Thank you, folks, for the support you’ve provided all these years!

When Soldiers and Pacifists Worked on the Same Team

Under what conditions would the Quakers, renowned pacifists, team up with an army? Historical non-fiction author Nancy Haines describes what happened in Verdun, France 100 years ago.

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Nancy Haines author photoRelevant History welcomes Nancy Haines, who worked seventeen years as an engineer, then ran an antiquarian bookstore. After her retirement, she fulfilled a lifelong dream to be an author. She published a nonfiction book, We Answered with Love, about Quaker relief service in France during WWI based on the love letters of two pacifists, and a picture book about spiritual decision making for Quaker children. She is currently researching the lives of the Quakers who were the original European settlers of Hillsborough, North Carolina, where she and her husband now reside, for a nonfiction book (or possibly try her hand at a novel). To learn more about her and her books, visit her web site.

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The American Army fights wars, and the Quakers are pacifists. But 100 years ago, at the end of World War I, the Army and the Quakers worked together in France to relieve some of the suffering that had been inflicted on the French citizens. Since 1917, Quakers (a.k.a. Friends) from Britain and America had been working in France, building houses, establishing medical centers for civilians, and doing agricultural work. Now that refugees could return to their villages, Friends would be able to provide vital support in helping to repair buildings, distribute furniture and bedding, supply seeds and farm tools, loan out heavy agricultural equipment, and provide medical services to the French people.

Work in Verdun
Destruction from WWIThe Quakers decided to concentrate their work in Verdun, the region that was hardest hit by the German invasion. As the Allies advanced northwest of Verdun, the Army gave Quaker workers permission to move in to meet the needs of over ten thousand refugees. The fighting had been almost continuous in this area. Only about five percent of the houses were left standing and these were badly damaged. One British worker described the abandoned battlefields:

On all sides can be seen the debris of an army: shells, cartridges, rotting clothes and boots, and rusty food tins by the hundreds. It is these last which give an air of everyday reality to the scene which otherwise (so bare and blasted as it is) might be taken almost for a freak of the imagination or the work of some supernatural power. When one sees a ‘Skipper’ sardine tin amongst all this chaos, then with a jump one is brought to the astounding fact that all this destruction is the work of modern civilisation and that all the resources of civilisation are behind it.

Quaker delivering suppliesWith financial assistance from the French government, the Quakers occupied the former divisional headquarters of the French and American armies. This center included barracks for the workers and barns to store supplies to support the workers, goods to be sold to the villagers, agricultural machinery, stables and breeding barns for livestock, and generators for electricity. The American Army provided trailers and fuel for distributing the supplies and building materials to the villages.

The American Army also gave Friends access to five depots or “dumps” of material and supplies that the Allies had abandoned as they withdrew from the region. Rufus Jones, in his book about the relief work in France, reported that “this material covered many acres at each “dump” and consisted of lumber, bar-iron and steel, farm and road implements of every sort, miles upon miles of barbed wire, and an almost indescribable mélange of all material which might be useful in a modern war.” The French government also allowed Friends to salvage from some of the German abandoned materials, and the national railroads agreed to carry it free of charge.

Restoring community life
The primary task in this region was to help the returning residents become independent so that they would only rely on the government for a limited time. Quakers established canteens in each village to feed the refugees until they were able to provide for themselves, hostels for people who had no other shelter, and schools for young children. The French government provided repatriation money to the residents of the villages, and the American Army supplied some equipment and transported materials. Their support enabled the Quakers to set up cooperative stores selling building materials, furnishings, and other necessities at or under cost, including many of the items they salvaged from the military dumps. When these stores became financially viable, they were turned over to the villagers to operate with the profit remaining in the community.

The French government encouraged French citizens to do the reconstruction work, so the Friends employed refugees at the headquarters and in the building projects, partly for wages and partly in exchange for the services they received. On some properties, farming was no longer viable because of the poor soil, trenches and shell holes, and the possible presence of unexploded bombs. Friends gave these families sheep, goats, pigs, chickens, and rabbits to raise and allowed them to use the barns at the former Army headquarters until their own sheds and corrals were built.

Employing German prisoners
The Allies offered the Friends the labor of German prisoners of war to help sort and load this material. The Friends were not permitted to pay the Germans, but many were willing to work to relieve the boredom. Quakers gave each German helper an opportunity to write a letter to his family and have his photograph taken. With passes provided by the Army, three Quakers undertook the arduous journey to Germany. They visited three hundred families of the prisoners, providing letters and photographs showing that their sons or husbands were in good health (unlike the German families themselves who were often undernourished and suffering). They also brought wages estimated to cover the value of the labor given by the men. Although the prisoners did not return to Germany for many more months, the visit of the Friends offered encouragement to their suffering families and the funds to help alleviate some of their hardships.

Leaving France
By early summer, the work of the Quakers had begun tapering off. They had laid the groundwork for restoring community life in the villages. Homes had been built or restored. Cooperative stores, schools, community centers, and agriculture were being run by French citizens. Finally, by the spring of 1920, the Quakers were able to turn their attention to new projects in Poland and Austria. The Quakers who had toiled in France went home to England and America or on to new postings.

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We Answered with Love book coverA big thanks to Nancy Haines! She’ll give away one paperback copy of We Answered with Love to a reader who contributes a comment on my blog. I’ll choose the winner from among those who comment by Friday at 6 p.m. ET. Delivery is available worldwide.

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How to Get Away with Murder in the Victorian Era

What if the ideal weapon to off that disagreeable person in your life was in your corner drugstore—and untraceable back to you? True crime and historical mystery author Kathryn McMaster discloses the surprising history of arsenic’s use and abuse in the 19th century.

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Kathryn Mcmaster author photoRelevant History welcomes Kathryn McMaster, a writer, entrepreneur, wife, mother, and organic farmer. She is also a bestselling author of historical murder mysteries set in the Victorian era, and modern true crime cases based on Canadian and American murders committed by young teens and couples. She co-owns the website One Stop Fiction, where readers can download free and discounted 4- and 5-star review books, and authors can showcase their work. She lives on her thirty-acre farm in the beautiful Casentino Valley, Italy where she divides her day between researching, writing, gardening and farm work. To learn more about her and her books, visit her web site, and follow her on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest.

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Arsenic advertisement for complexionWhen I was at school learning about the Victorian Era of 1837–1901, we were taught about the social impact and impoverishment the Industrial Revolution brought to certain sectors of society when machinery replaced manual labor. What we were not taught was how prevalent arsenic was during this period in the production of household goods, fabric, and even beauty products used by those in the upper echelons of society.

When I started researching certain murder cases for my earlier novels that are set in this era, I stumbled upon this very different social aspect of Victorian living. It was rather fascinating just how common arsenic was and how difficult it was at the time to detect its use as a choice of murder weapon, used more often by women.

With the symptoms of arsenic poisoning often confused with cholera, these types of murders were very difficult to detect, even with an autopsy.

Arsenic was everywhere! It was prevalent in paints using Scheel’s Green for the green pigments. It was found in wallpaper, fly strips, and even impregnated in clothing fabrics and curtains.

Not all pharmacies enforced a poisons book. So, if you bought arsenic, you did not always have to sign for it. In addition, in some factories the arsenic lay in large, uncovered barrels placed in unsecured areas. It was therefore readily accessible to workers and impossible to detect if a teaspoon, a tablespoon, or even a cup of arsenic was missing at the end of the day.

My second book, Blackmail, Sex and Lies, covers the life and times of the infamous socialite Madeleine Smith, accused of poisoning her working-class lover, Pierre Emile L’Angelier with arsenic. The book highlights the accessibility of this poison and how it was a common ingredient in many household products; this casts doubt on her guilt, especially as L’Angelier took arsenic as a health benefit!

Arsenic soap advertisementDuring this time in history it was discovered that by giving horses arsenic in small amounts it gave them stamina which enabled them to endure long distances. People started to dabble and found that in small doses it did the same for them. Arsenic then began to appear as an ingredient in beauty wafers and soaps. Articles in popular magazines such as Blackwoods encouraged women to bathe in it to soften their skin.

With L’Angelier eating arsenic, and Madeleine Smith using it as a beauty wash during the time he conveniently died when a much wealthier suitor arrived on the scene, there is great doubt as to who or what had killed him. Although the coroner was able to count the arsenic grains inside L’Angelier’s stomach, with limited forensic knowledge and a lack of access to more modern science, Madeleine Smith may well have gotten away with murder. In the end, the case was not proven, which meant that for time immemorial, it has been a case of, ‘did she, or didn’t she?’ The answer only Madeleine Smith knew for sure.

Although police had fingerprinting and other presumptive tests for blood evidence etc., forensic science during the Victorian era was still in its infancy. Due to rudimentary police training and the absence of modern forensic science, many arsenic crimes went undetected and unpunished.

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Blackmail Sex and Lies book coverA big thanks to Kathryn McMaster! She’ll give away one paperback copy of Blackmail, Sex and Lies to a reader who contributes a comment on my blog. I’ll choose the winner from among those who comment by Friday at 6 p.m. ET. Delivery is available worldwide.

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Britain’s Magical, Mystical Dark Ages

Did some Druids survive the Romans’ attack c. 60-61AD? History is written by the victors, and my blog guest this week, historical fiction author Sharon Bradshaw, challenges certain “facts” people accept about history in the British Isles.

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Sharon Bradshaw author photoRelevant History welcomes Sharon Bradshaw, a historical fiction author, storyteller, and poet. Sharon loves reading archaeology books and talked to a lot of monks in the 8th century while writing the Durstan series. A Druid’s Magic is set in the real Middle-Earth we called the Dark Ages. Subscribers to The Storyteller’s Newsletter receive a free short story from her every month. Sharon lives with her family and a large collection of books near Warwick Castle, in the UK. To learn more about her and her books, visit her web site, and follow her on Facebook and Twitter.

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I write the Durstan series about a young monk in 794AD on the Hebridean island of Iona. The early Medieval period (500AD–1000AD), which I had been taught at school to call the “Dark Ages,” wasn’t dark at all. It was a rich and magical place where spellcasting and superstition were rife. A pantheon of old gods existed from the Iron Age, and before.

Celtic crossPeople believed in the existence of elves, faeries, and dragons in a way that was not so far removed from J.R.R Tolkien’s Middle-earth. All of this was reflected in Anglo-Saxon and Celtic art, jewelry, and weapons; ancient place names; and a belief in destiny woven through the threads of the Wyrd. The monks themselves were regarded as spellcasters. The letters they wrote were similar to the marks made by a Druid’s runes.

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Monasteries and the early Church
I was also taught that everyone converted to Christianity as soon as it arrived in the British Isles. Yet the further I delved into the past, the more it became clear. Christianity had stood for centuries side-by-side with belief in the ancestors’ gods. The Synod of Whitby in 664AD highlighted the depth to which diversity in belief ran at that time. Not only was there a pantheon of gods, all of which was not necessarily followed by every individual, but differences existed within the Church itself. Easter was celebrated on separate dates by Celtic and Roman rival followings, and a monk’s tonsure was cut in a way which depended on whether he followed St. John or St. Peter.

Despite the 4th-century Benedictine rule being recognised by the Iona monastery, Lindisfarne, and others, the rule wasn’t strictly observed until after the Norman Conquest. Until then, an abbot could run a monastery however he chose. Monks married and fathered children, ignoring the vow of chastity, while monks and nuns could live together as they did in Whitby. If that wasn’t enough, the Vikings brought their own gods with them when they raided Lindisfarne in 793AD and later settled in the British Isles.

What happened on Anglesey?
AngleseyMany believe that all the Druids were massacred by the Romans during the Boudican revolt c. 60-61AD. Druids in Gaul had been obliterated earlier, and historians relied for centuries on a sparse account by Tacitus (56–120AD) of what happened on the island of Anglesey. He didn’t write from personal experience, and his work is no longer regarded as impartial. Sadly the Druids didn’t leave behind an alternate version of events for us to read. Nor did they use a form of writing which would have enabled them to do so.

Celtic Ireland
A number of Druids fled from the Romans during the first century AD to seek refuge in Celtic Ireland, which remained free from occupation. They played an important part in its mythology and became counselors to kings and respected prophets. Early Irish law confirms their decline as Christianity spread, but these men were still regarded highly in the 6th century when they taught the Aethelings. It’s possible that they traveled again through the British Isles, in particular after the Romans left in 410.

We know that some of their order joined the Church. Adomnan, Abbot of Iona (628–724AD) and biographer of St. Columba (521–597AD), attributes the saint with many qualities of a shaman: weather magic, miracles, second sight, and angelic apparitions. St. Columba came from a Druidic background in Ireland. Other saints were similarly attributed with these magical qualities, which remained an important part of the belief system in Anglo-Saxon Middle Earth.

The Druid bards
The bards told their stories when there was a feast. Beowulf and fragments in the 10th-century Exeter Book are thought to be examples of earlier tales from the 7th-century mead halls. A warlord who had yet to convert to Christianity would have welcomed the man or woman who could read the stars better than himself and converse with the gods. Even better if there was a tale or two to be told.

Despite no longer being leaders of Celtic society in the early Medieval period, the descendants of the Druid bards kept traditional beliefs alive in their tales of the past, while belief in the gods and goddesses of old survives today. You’ll find it in our long history of storytelling, folklore, and legend.

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A Druid's Magic book coverA big thanks to Sharon Bradshaw! She’ll give away one ebook copy of A Druid’s Magic to a reader in the UK who contributes a comment on my blog as well as one ebook copy to a reader in the United States who contributes a comment. I’ll choose the two winners from among those who comment by Tuesday at 6 p.m. ET.

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