Letters to the Editor — April 2019

Originally published April 2019 · p. 2

I enjoy the Civil War News and find it most informative. The piece on Hiram Roosa’s collection was especially timely, as I had been asked to give a book report in February to the San Fernando Valley [Los Angeles area] Civil War Roundtable on The Rest I Will Kill: William Tillman and the unforgettable story of how a free black man refused to become a slave by Brian McGinty (Liveright Publishing Corp, New York, 2016). However, I believe that Roosa’s and Leon Reed’s statements that the captain and officers of the SJ Waring were set free in Cuba may be in error. McGinty (page 92) asserts that on July 9, two days after capturing the Waring near New York City, the Confederate privateer Jeff Davis intercepted the Mary Goodell off Rhode Island and transferred all her prisoners, including those taken from the Waring, to the Goodell. The Goodell promptly returned to Portland, Maine. So the citizens of New York had word of the Waring’s capture before that ship returned. Given the relative distances between New York and Charleston, and New York and Cuba, the release of prisoners in the North seems far more likely. “Let Them Rest” by Gould Hagler was also very good. Nancy Martsch Sherman Oaks, Calif.