Life in a time of crisis
Everyone loves candy, and people during the Civil War period were no different. Recipe books of the time feature numerous recipes for sweets of all kinds. Mrs. Cowan's American Lady's Cookbook (1847) includes recipes for coconut, lemon, rose, horehound, and rock candy as well as peppermints and molasses twists. Commercial candy was also widely enjoyed.... Continue Reading →
While soldiers in the field were waiting for their turkeys to arrive packed in crates filled with straw and kept cold, hopefully, by winter weather, at home women were preparing to roast their turkeys. Roasting a turkey in the 1800s meant cooking it on a spit inside a tin oven. Catherine Esther Beecher in her 1859... Continue Reading →
As much as the pumpkin is used as a term of ridicule, who ever saw a pumpkin that seemed to quail or look sheepish? Henry Ward BeecherHenry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) was minister of the Plymouth Congregational Church in Brooklyn. He is best known for his break with his father's hell and brimstone Calvinism to a belief in... Continue Reading →
American Civil War Voices 