Saturday, June 01, 2013

Pg. 99: Peter Carlson's "Junius and Albert’s Adventures in the Confederacy"

The current feature at the Page 99 Test: Junius and Albert's Adventures in the Confederacy: A Civil War Odyssey by Peter Carlson.

About the book, from the publisher:
The thrilling true story of a pair of reporters swept up in the Civil War, captured, and thrown into jail, and their attempt to escape and return home to file their own extraordinary story

Albert Richardson and Junius Browne, two correspondents for the New York Tribune, were captured at the Battle of Vicksburg and spent twenty months in horrific prisons before escaping and making their way to Union territory.

Their amazing, long-forgotten odyssey is one of the great escape stories in American history, packed with drama, courage, horrors and heroics, plus many moments of antic comedy. They must endure the Confederacy's most notorious prison; rely on forged passes and the secret signals of a covert pro-Union organization in North Carolina; trust a legendary guerilla leader; and ultimately depend on a mysterious, anonymous woman on a white horse to guide them to safety. They traveled for 340 miles, most of it on foot, much of it through snow, in twenty-six days.

This is a marvelous, surreal voyage through the cold mountains, dark prisons, and mysterious bands of misfits living in the shadows of the Civil War.
Learn more about the book and author at Peter Carlson's website.

The Page 99 Test: Junius and Albert's Adventures in the Confederacy.

--Marshal Zeringue