<![CDATA[Jennifer Bohnhoff - Thin Air: My Blog About Writing and My Books]]>

<![CDATA[Jennifer Bohnhoff - Thin Air: My Blog About Writing and My Books]]>Sun, 19 May 2024 02:27:13 -0600Weebly<![CDATA[Saying Goodbye to Old Friends]]>Thu, 16 May 2024 06:00:00 GMThttps://jenniferbohnhoff.com/thin-air-my-blog-about-writing-and-my-books/saying-goodbye-to-old-friends

This fall, I'm going to say goodbye to some old friends. I'm already feeling a little blue about it.

I first met Jemmy Martin back in 2015. I was teaching New Mexico history to 7th graders, many of whom complained about how much they hated history. It was boring, they said: just dates and names. That's when I began thinking about writing historical fiction that would flesh out those dates and names: give them dreams and hopes and personalities. I knew the events I wanted to portray in my novel, but I couldn't find anyone who was everywhere I wanted him to be, so I created Jemmy. He is based on a number of different real people I encountered through diaries, journals, newspaper articles and rosters.

Jemmy is a farm boy from the countryside outside San Antonio, Texas. He enters New Mexico with Henry Sibley's Confederate Army of New Mexico not because he believes in the cause, but because his brother signs up himself and the family's mules to haul supplies. When the brother backs out, Jemmy feels compelled to accompany the mules and bring them safely back to the family. It is a mission that he discovers to be much more dangerous and complicated than he'd envisioned.

When he gets to New Mexico, Jemmy becomes involved in the Battle of Valverde. There, he meets Raul Atencio. Raul is another character that I developed inspired by real people. He is the nephew of a rich merchant in Socorro, New Mexico, but his father is a peon, a member of the lower class. He wants to become rich and influential like his uncle, who is supporting the Union soldiers at Fort Craig because it is lining his pocket, not because he feels any particular allegiance. Like Jemmy, Raul is not interested in the causes of the Civil War, but becomes embroiled in it nonetheless. This causes him to reconsider his place in society, and several aspects of his culture, including its relationship with Anglos and Native Americans.

In 2017, I published the story of Jemmy and Raul's encounter at the Battle of Valverde in a middle grade novel entitled Valverde. Luckily for me, and for the story, Geoff Habiger, the publisher at Artemesia Publishing saw the potential in my book and picked it up for Kinkajou Press, his middle grade imprint. The story was republished in 2022 with a new cover, a new title, and editing that made it both a tighter and a more emotionally satisfying story.

But the Battle of Valverde was not the end of the story of New Mexico during the Civil War. The Army of New Mexico continues north, and Jemmy goes with it. He passes through Socorro, Albuquerque, and finally encounters the Union Army again in Glorieta Pass, a mountainous valley southeast of Santa Fe. There he meets Cian Lachlann, an Irish boy who has joined the Union Army so that he can be fed and clothed. His greatest desire is to find a family and some place to call home. Cian's family immigrated to America to escape the Irish Potato Famine. After his mother and father died, the orphan boy travels west to mine for gold in Colorado. From there, he joins the Colorado Volunteers, who travel south to block the Confederate progress. He and Jemmy meet up on the last day of the Battle of Glorieta Pass, where the Confederates suffer a devastating loss to their supply train.

The story of Jemmy and Cian's encounter at the Battle of Glorieta Pass was first published as a middle grade novel entitled Glorieta in 2020. Kinkajou Press republished the story as The Worst Enemy in 2023.

Where Duty Calls has won the CIPA EVVY AND NM-AZ Book awards and was a finalist for the Spur and the Zia. The Worst Enemy was also a Spur award finalist.

The highpoint of the story of the Civil War in New Mexico may be the Battle of Glorieta, but that is not the end of the story. The end doesn't come until the Confederate Army is out of New Mexico. That end comes in The Famished Country, the final book in my trilogy. I didn't write this book until after Geoff had picked up the first two, so there will only be one edition, whose cover I will reveal soon. In this third book, readers will learn whether Jemmy, Raul and Cian are able to fulfill their deepest wishes. Does Jemmy bring home his mules? Does Raul achieve the social standing he craves? Does Cian find a place he belongs? Or does each boy outgrow his original desire?

In addition to having to say goodbye to my three boys, I'll be leaving Annabelle Watkins, the beautiful but petulant daughter of a Union Major, who stole Raul's heart, tried to steal Jemmy's and really wants to leave the uncivilized west for boarding school and a chance for a place in high society.

I've been a little melancholy thinking about the end of the story. Even if they are not real, I feel that Annabelle, Jemmy, Raul and Cian are going to continue their lives without my watching over the process. They've become old friends in the years that I have explored their actions and personalities.

I'll also be leaving a supporting cast of real, historical people. Unlike my fictitious characters, I know the outcome of these people's lives, and I didn't have any say in those outcomes. Some, I am proud to have met. Others become people I am not proud of.

If you haven't begun this story, I advise you pick up Where Duty Calls now. Read it and The Worst Enemy, so that you'll be ready when The Famished Country comes out this October..

Jennifer Bohnhoff is a former educator and the author of a dozen books for middle grade and adult readers. You can learn more about her and her books on her website.

]]><![CDATA[Meg Goes to America: An Interview with Katy Hammel]]>Thu, 09 May 2024 06:00:00 GMThttps://jenniferbohnhoff.com/thin-air-my-blog-about-writing-and-my-books/meg-goes-to-america-an-interview-with-katy-hammel

One of my favorite books this spring was Meg Goes to America, by Albuquerque author Katy Hammel. The gold winner of the Douglas Preston Award for Published Fiction, this middle grade novel tells the story of Kay, a missionary's daughter who was born and raised in Japan. With the coming of WWII, it is no longer a safe place for Americans, and so her family leaves for the United States -- or that's the plan. When father is detained by Japanese officials, Meg, her younger but very wise young brother, and her mother must make the trip back to Michigan on their own. It's a harrowing trip, but not more harrowing than learning to fit into American society. This novel hit all the sweet spots for me: it is historically accurate and the author really understands how middle grade girls think. Even more enticing, it's based on the real story of the author's mother! I was so interested and charmed that I asked the author if I could interview her. Here are the responses she gave me to my questions.

What inspired you to write this novel? Why do you think it's an important story to share with middle grade readers?

I wasn’t satisfied there were enough books that portray the inner life of a ‘thinky’ child who grapples with big ideas about religion and loneliness and countries and cultures. When I was growing up, I treasured the novels of Louisa May Alcott and Laura Ingalls Wilder and Madeleine L’Engle. They wrote books about America that were specific to time and place through the lens of girl protagonists. I wanted to participate in that kind of story-telling.

Other than family history, how much research did you have to do to write Meg Goes to America? Where did you get the most help?

Katy Hammel

Family history was definitely the beginning. The character of Meg is inspired by my mother and Meg Goes to America recounts their actual journey from Japan to the U.S. My mother and uncle shared memories, photos, and letters with me and my uncle explicitly gave me permission to write the story. But I had a few other aces up my sleeve. First, back in the early 80’s, I interviewed my grandfather about his experiences during the war years. He recorded the story of his incarceration for me on the cassette Dictaphone he used to prepare his sermons. I digitalized that audio recording and I still have it, so I can hear my grandfather’s actual voice with his distinctive timbre and tone whenever I want. Second, my parents became missionaries to Japan post-war and I grew up there, so the things Meg thinks and experiences in the book are actually an amalgam of my mother’s memories and my own. Third, the Presbyterian Historical Society had a portfolio about my grandparents and other records about missionaries held in Japan during World War II. Those repositories were useful.

Meg and The Rocks: 2023 Winner in the WILLA Literary Awards Young Adult Fiction and Nonfiction category

You had to move from middle grade to young adult to write the next book in the series, Meg and the Rocks. Why did you do that?

That was a decision I tussled with for a long time. It was very important to me that my main character of Meg be a moral decision-maker who had agency to take actions that had impact. That’s hard to pull off in a setting driven by world and family calamities outside her control. Everyone who writes historically based fiction for children faces this problem, including you! I’m thinking about books like the “I Survived” series, Titanicat by Marty Crisp, and your “Rebels Along the Rio Grande” books. There is a scene in the second book where Meg confronts an evil doer and of course, the second book gets us closer to the U.S. dropping atomic bombs on Japan. It’s mature content.

What’s next?

Meg is a teenager at the close of Meg and the Rocks and the family is about to leave the Manzanar concentration camp where her father worked as a chaplain with our Japanese-American prisoners. I’m going to have the family move to Albuquerque, which is definitely not what happened IRL. Stay tuned because Meg is growing up!

Click here to see more on Katy Hammel's books.

I've got three copies of Meg Goes to America to send off to three interested readers. Leave a comment and tell my why this book appeals to you, and I'll pick three people at random.

]]><![CDATA[Finding Fantasy Inspiration On the Internet]]>Fri, 26 Apr 2024 16:30:38 GMThttps://jenniferbohnhoff.com/thin-air-my-blog-about-writing-and-my-books/finding-fantasy-inspiration-on-the-internet

My first fantasy novel, Raven Quest, comes out next month. In the past few weeks, I've shared how a walk through the woods inspired me to write this story, and how I based the fantasy world in which it is set on the history of my neighborhood.

Another source of inspiration for me was, believe it or not, social media. I know what you're thinking: writers use social media to procrastinate and avoid writing. And that's sometimes (ok, I admit it. OFTEN) the case. If you edited the chart below so that the purple area said "Facebook" instead of Netflix, you'd have

a pretty accurate measure of my time on the computer. But sometimes that wasted time pays off in new ideas and inspiration. Just one glance at my saved file on Facebook proves it!

Take, for instance, the post on the Blue Men of Minch that I saved in February of 2023. Scottish folklore says that the blue men of the Minch, also known as storm kelpies are mythological creatures inhabiting the stretch of water between the northern Outer Hebrides and mainland Scotland. They watch for sailors to drown and stricken boats to sink. They have the power to create storms,twist and dive like porpoises, and challenge ship captains to poetry contests, sinkings the vessels of those who fail. My imagination changed these men from blue to green, and made them shape-shifting frogs.

Photographer Amy Kierstead posted this stunning shot of ice on the surface of a small pond. She named it "The Eye of the Forest." I call it beautiful and the inspiration for Iyara, the water woman who is the personification of all the streams in the forest outside of Lumbra. The picture below also inspired me.

So yes, I do waste a lot of time on social media, but all the while, ideas are taking shape, building bit by bit, a single pebble of inspiration that begins rolling, gains mass, and becomes an avalanche of story ideas.

Raven Quest, Jennifer's first fantasy novel, is appropriate for readers in 4th grade and above. Coming out on May 20th, it is now available to preorder as an ebook. You may also buy the paperback version directly from the author and she will be happy to sign and dedicate your copy before sending it.

]]><![CDATA[History of a Neighborhood becomes History of a Fantasy World]]>Thu, 18 Apr 2024 06:00:00 GMThttps://jenniferbohnhoff.com/thin-air-my-blog-about-writing-and-my-books/history-of-a-neighborhood-becomes-history-of-a-fantasy-worldIn my last blog I shared how a walk with my granddaughter began me on the path to writing a fantasy, and how some bent little trees, one giant old ash, and a strange wreath-like structure at the top of a tree inspired me enough to work their way into the story that became Raven Quest.

Because all of these things were close by where I lived, I began thinking of the story as taking place in my own neighborhood, which has an interesting history. That history worked its way into the very heart of the story.
The history of my area begins in 1706, when a group of Spanish colonizers founded Albuquerque not far from the banks of the Rio Grande. An alluvial fan slopes eastward to the Sandia Mountains, which were a rich source of lumber, minerals, wildlife and other resources for not only the new colonizers, but for the people who had come before the Spanish, the Puebloans who lived along the river and Apache and other nomadic tribes who moved throughout the nearby plains and mountains.

Frequent raids, especially by the Apache, caused the Spanish to establish outlying land grants that acted as buffers between Albuquerque and marauding tribes. One of the first, Cañon de Carnué, was established in the pass between the Sandia and Manzano Mountains in 1763. As the villages grew, they split, creating the new villages of Tijeras, San Antonio, Manzano, Chilili, and others, that dotted the east side of Sandia Mountain. Many of these grants were given not to individuals, but to communities of people. In these grants, while individuals might own their houses, the surrounding fields and resources were shared by everyone.

Many of the settlers of these outlying land grants were Genizaros, Native Americans who had been taken captive in battles with the Spanish or stolen from their people. Genizaro lived as servants and slaves within Spanish homes, tending sheep, gardening, performing household chores and tending to their master’s children. They learned to live in the Spanish style and wore European clothing. They adopted the Spanish surnames of their masters and gained Christian first names through baptism. While they remained ethnically Indigenous, the became culturally Spanish. Unlike African slaves in the American south, Genizaros who adapted well to Spanish customs were often freed after a term of service.

These freed Genizaros were happy to settle on land grants because, while dangerous, it offered the opportunity to own land and gain social and economic autonomy. Many of these new communities combined Spanish customs with the Native customs of their youth, creating new forms of religion, language, and social practice. These communities became tight-knit and loyal to each other but often suspicious of outsiders.

Not far from where I live is the ghost town of La Madera. Founded sometime around 1849, its settlers likely came from the Las Huertas Land Grant or from the little village of San Pedro Viejo. Because of the distance and the rugged terrain, the village had to be self sustaining. Its fields grew melons, squash, pinto beans and corn. Sheep and cows grazed in meadows watered from a spring that was just up the valley from the village. In 1860, 25 families called La Madera home.

But that doesn’t mean that La Madera had no contact with the outside world. Madera is Spanish for lumber, which seems to have been the chief source of income for the village. I’ve been told that many of the vigas, or roof trusses in houses in Albuquerque’s Old Town originated in La Madera Canyon. In addition to a church and a school La Madera had a large building that served as a dance hall, stage coach stop, and post office.

When the United States seized control during the Mexican-American War, life in New Mexico began to change, sometimes in ways that were very detrimental to these small communities. Because the American system of ownership did not recognize community-based systems, many of the old grants were denied their property and the rights of communities to the resources surrounding them. Villagers could no longer be assured access to the mountain’s forests and other resources if those slopes were sold to others.

In 1875, the village was threatened when Henry Caldwell, an immigrant from Hamburg, Germany, purchased a track of land south (up stream) from La Madera, which he used for farming and livestock, both of which used water that had always flowed down to their village. The situation became even more dire in 1880, when an organization named San Pedro and Cañon del Agua Water Company built a dam 2 miles uphill from the town. 80 feet high, 300 feet long and 20 feet thick, the dam included a 15” pipe that directed the water past La Madera to the new gold, copper, and silver mines in San Pedro. Without water, the village was doomed.

Today, La Madera church is a private home and the stagecoach stop is a ruin. Except for these two buildings and a graveyard, nothing remains of the village. However, the idea of an isolated village threatened with the loss of its water by an outside power intrigued me, and the town of La Madera transformed itself in my mind into the fictional town of Lumbra.

Raven Quest if Jennifer Bohnhoff's first fantasy novel. It is due to come out on May 20, 2024.

You can preorder the ebook on Amazon for just .99. Price will go up after May 20.

You can also preorder the paperback directly from the author on her website. Purchasers will get a free bag of goodies, and book will be at a reduced price.

]]><![CDATA[Where I got the idea for Raven Quest]]>Thu, 11 Apr 2024 06:00:00 GMThttps://jenniferbohnhoff.com/thin-air-my-blog-about-writing-and-my-books/where-i-got-the-idea-for-raven-quest

Next week I'll reveal the cover for Raven Quest, my first ever fantasy novel.

On May 20, 2024, I’m going to release my first ever fantasy novel. It’s the story of Savio, a shepherd who lives in Lumbra. a sleepy village sitting in the shadow of majestic Pastique mountain. The bustling capital city of the old Nacixem Empire lies just on the other side of the mountain.

While the villagers have enjoyed a quiet life, living in the traditional ways of their ancestors, all is not well now. The Nacixem Empire has been conquered by the Olgna. Change is coming. One of the first changes is the drying up of the stream that supplies water to Lumbra. Only those like Savio and his grandmother, who can see into the realms beyond human reality, may be able to stop it.

Savio doesn’t think he has what it takes to save the village. For starters, an old trauma stops him from taking up the cudgel, the weapon that adult men in Lumbra use for protection. He’s also unsure he can accept the strange new reality he finds himself in. Savio must put aside his doubts and fears and join forces with a raven, a squirrel, and his faithful dog to complete a quest that will make the water flow once more. In his new form, Savio finds he has powers that he never had as a human. Can he use them, and the weapon he’s been avoiding, to overcome an evil that threatens his very way of life, or will he die trying?

The cudgel the men of Lumbra carry is similar to this, but with a much larger knob on the right end.

Maybe you’re wondering where I got the idea for this book. Ask anyone who knows me and you’ll discover I’ve got a pretty vivid imagination. I can see all kinds of things that aren’t there. I can imagine all sorts of scenarios. But this story definitely got its start when my granddaughter and I went on a walk soon after I moved to a new neighborhood in 2017.

My granddaughter and the shelter she built in my woods.

My dog Panzer and a fairy arch. Both made it into my novel.

My new house was high up on Sandia Mountain, east of Albuquerque. It is surrounded by ponderosa pine and douglas fir forest. Soon after I’d moved in, I took my granddaughter on a little exploration of a ravine that runs through my property. We passed some small oaks that had grown tall, seeking sunshine, then given up. My granddaughter called these trees ‘fairy arches’ and warned me not to go under one. The wheels of my imagination began turning.

I showed her a tree that my sons and I had found fifteen years before the house was built, when my husband and I had first bought the land on which the house finally stood. This fir is very old and has a huge trunk. My sons had dubbed it the fairy tree. A neighbor called it the family tree, because she, her husband and daughter could just touch fingertips when they stood around it. I knew I had to include that tree in my story.

And then, one day I was driving the long and windy road toward my neighborhood. I’d traveled about a mile away from my mailbox when I noticed something very strange: a ring in the sky formed by the curving of the tops of trees. This definitely had to show up in my book!

But the story didn’t start coming together in my mind until I learned about the history of my neighborhood. It turns out, my neighborhood once had a thriving town. Little is left, but the history is fascinating. I'll go into more detail in my next blog.

Raven Quest will be available in ebook and paperback on May 20. It is now available to preorder in ebook form on Amazon for a special, introductory price of 99¢.

]]><![CDATA[Divided Duty]]>Thu, 04 Apr 2024 06:00:00 GMThttps://jenniferbohnhoff.com/thin-air-my-blog-about-writing-and-my-books/divided-duty

the United States Library of Congress Prints and Photographs division. digital ID 04642

Recently, one of my fans let me know that there was a poem about Alexander McRrae, the Union officer who lost his battery of artillery pieces to the Confederates at the Battle of Valverde. Given that tidbit of information, I went down a rabbit hole and discovered not only a poem, but a couple of interesting people.

The poet, it turns out, is a man named Theodore Marburg. Marburg wrote a number of books. Some are poetry. Others are treatises on economics, government, the Spanish American War, and The League of Nations. He was also the United States Minister to Belgium from 1912 to 1914, the executive secretary of an organization called the League to Enforce Peace, and a prominent advocate of the League of Nations

Marburg was born in Baltimore, Maryland on July 10, 1862, which means that McRae was already dead when the poet was born. I found that interesting, and wondered what caused him to want to write a poem about someone he never knew. He died in Vancouver on March 3, 1946.

The poem about Captain McRae, entitled DIVIDED DUTY, comes from In The Hills: Poems, a small volume that was privately printed in Paris 1893, then revised and reprinted by The Knickerocker Press, a division of G.P. Putnam’s Sons, in 1924.

The poem has a footnote, which says

When the American civil war began there happened to be in the regular service a young officer whose home, with all that the word implies, was the South. There were many such. His story is but a type. Is it difficult to picture the struggle that came to them with the sense of a divided duty? This one, with the clearer vision which events have justified, felt that the higher duty was the preservation of the nation; but the thought of fighting against his kindred and the friends of his boyhood so preyed on his mind that he is believed to have courted the death which soon came to him. When the element of fate enters, hurrying the just and the brave to a tragic end, the story must always excite our interest and sympathy. At the battle of Val Verde in New Mexico, February 21, 1862, our hero met his death. The battery, of which, although a cavalry officer, he had been given command for the day, was overwhelmed by the Texans. He remained seated on one of the guns, defending himself until the enemy shot him down. They did him the honor to give his name to one of our forts and to take him back to West Point, to the quiet cemetery in the hills.

McRae's tombstone. It is just four stones down from that of George Armstrong Custer

The poem is almost as much about the beautiful setting of the West Point Cemetery as it is about the man buried there. It made me wonder if the tombstone inspired the poet to research the man buried beneath it.

McRae, a native North Carolinian, commanded Company I, 3rd United States Regular Cavalry. His commanding officer, Colonel Edward R.S. Canby, had given him an artillery battery of six pieces. During the Battle of Valverde, February 21, 1862, McRae's battery performed with great success until about 750 Confederate Texans led by Colonel Thomas Green charged the Union guns. Screaming the Rebel yell, the three waves of confederates were poorly armed with short-range shotguns, pistols, muskets, and bowie knives. Green had instructed his men to drop to the ground whenever they saw flashes from the artiller's muzzles. The Union men thought they were inflicting great casualties on the Rebels, but the fact that they just kept coming spooked the New Mexico Volunteers supporting McRae and his officers. Many fled the battery and ran panic-stricken across the Rio Grande, unnerving the Volunteer troops who were then being held in reserve.

The Texans fell upon the battery and fierce hand-to-hand fighting swirled around the artillery pieces. Samuel Lockridge, a Texan officer leading the charge is reported to have shouted, "Surrender McRae, we don't want to kill you!" to which the North Carolinian replied, "I shall never forsake my guns!" Both men then suffered fatal bullet wounds. The loss of the battery caused Colonel Canby to issue orders for a full retreat to Fort Craig. The captured guns, thereafter known as the Valverde Battery, continued to fire against Union troops for the remainder of the war.

After the war, Confederate Gen. Henry Sibley, who led the Confederate forces into New Mexico, wrote a letter to Alexander McRae’s father. In it, he said "The universal voice of this Army attests to the gallantry of your son. He fell valiantly defending the battery he commanded. There are few fallen soldiers that are admired by both armies of a conflict. Capt. Alexander McRae was one."

DIVIDED DUTY

OH, plateau the eagle's brood has known
What potent dead you hold!
In fear of God, in duty's light,
For country and for human right
On varied fields they fought the fight
And, while you claim their mould,

They live and will live through the year,
Though deaf to drum and fife,
For manly deeds are fertile seeds
That spring again to life.

What peace, what perfect peace broods o'er
The soldiers ' burial - ground
Here in the heart of the silent hills
With Hudson flowing round.

A stately guard, these mighty hills,
Close crowding one another,
Gigantic Storm King locking arms
With Old Cro ' Nest, his brother!

Their summits command to the North a range
Where a sleeping figure lies
Stretched on its back on the mountain tops
Against the changing skies.

There Rip Van Winkle, the children know,
Beheld with exceeding wonder
The queer little men whose ninepin balls
Create the summer thunder.

Down from the Donderberg scurried the winds
That tossed the Dutch sailor of yore.
Down from the highlands the captains came
When trembled and strained a nation's frame,
When all the fair land was aflame,
Aflame with civil war.

Far in the South was the home of one '
Twas there he had spent life's morn-
Where winds are soft and women are kind
And gentleness is born;

Where the grey moss waves from the great live - oak
And the scarlet tanager flutters;
Where the mocking - bird, hid in the bamboo- vine,
Its passionate melody utters.

The boom of the gun upon Sumter that caused
A million hearts to sicken,
That rolled o'er the land and grew as it rolled
While a knell in the mother's breast was tolled
And city and meadow and mountain old
With the spirit of war were stricken,

Brought from the hills of the Hudson one
Whose home was the South, ' tis true,
But o'er him the flag of his fathers waved:
He marched in command of the blue.
Oh, the sad story, the story they tell,
The story of duty and death!
The comfort of heaven, the anguish of hell,
Surging with every breath!

Out from the North, the awakening North,
Came comrades whose step was light.
Ah! that was their home, and a mother's prayer
Went with them into the fight.

Measureless plains of the wide South - west
Ye shook ' neath the tread of men.
Nor winds of the prairie, though mighty they be,
That fashioned your reaches like waves of the sea,
Nor rush of the bison once roaming you free
Have caused you to tremble as when
Through all the long day the sulphureous smoke
Hung heavy over the field
And man from his brother the hand of God
Seemed powerless to shield.

The battle is lost.
What use to stay When his men are slain or fled!
Did anguish too great for the brave to bear
Bring longing to lie with the dead?

His battery silenced, on one of the guns
Alone he sat ' mid the rout,
Unmoved as the cliff that the ocean in anger
Whirls its white surges about

A whirlwind of dust, a whirlwind of men,
A whirlwind of lead therefrom,
A vain pistol shot from the figure alone
And the coveted end had come.

What peace, what perfect peace broods now
O'er the beautiful burial - ground,
Up in the hills, the stately hills,
With the river flowing round.

1916: Captain Marburg and his first wife

In researching the poet, I found that Theodore Marburg had an interesting son. Captain Theodore Marburg Jr. was born November 27, 1893 in France and attended Oxford University. When World War I broke out, he joined the Royal Flying Corps, which required him to take the oath of allegiance to the British Government. While on a mission to photograph the German lines in 1915, his plane crashed and a strut pierced his left knee, requiring the leg to be amputated. Marburg wanted to return to the US to get an American-made artificial leg, but the U.S. government refused to issue him a passport since, according to their interpretation of law, he had broken his allegiance to the United States by taking the oath in Britain. His widely publicized case led President Wilson to a bill in October 1917 that restored US citizenship to US citizens who enlisted in Canadian, British, and French services before the US declaration of war if they took an oath of allegiance at a US consulate. Marburg then came back to the U.S. and was treated at the Johns Hopkins Hospital.
Marburg’s life did not go well after the war. Believing an outdoor life would be good for his health, Marburg moved to Arizona, where he purchased a cattle ranch. His first wife, Baroness Gesell de Vavario of Belgium, did not like ranch life and divorced him. He had only been married a month when he shot himself in the head on February 17, 1922. He was buried in Druid Ridge Cemetery in Pikesville, Maryland. It would be interesting to learn more about Marburg Jr. and his struggles.

Jennifer Bohnhoff is the author of a number of historical novels for middle grade and adult readers. Where Duty Calls, the first in the trilogy Rebels Along the Rio Grande, includes the scene where McRae's battery is charged by the Confederates. A Blaze of Poppies tells the story of a young, female rancher from New Mexico who serves as a nurse in World War I and comes back to marry a wounded American soldier.

]]><![CDATA[The Civil War Battle of Albuquerque]]>Thu, 28 Mar 2024 06:00:00 GMThttps://jenniferbohnhoff.com/thin-air-my-blog-about-writing-and-my-books/the-civil-war-battle-of-albuquerque

La Glorieta today. It was originally built sometime before 1803. John Phelan, CC BY-SA 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

The Battle of Albuquerque was one of the least significant battles of the American Civil War. It was so small that it is more appropriately called a skirmish.

General H.H. Sibley’s Army of New Mexico had begun with great intentions. Its leader had planned to take the California and Colorado goldfields at little cost to the Confederacy, fulfilling a Southern version of Manifest Destiny. But things went wrong from the start, and they soon discovered that New Mexicans were not as willing to feed and shelter an army made up of Texans as Sibley had supposed.

After its supply train was destroyed while they were fighting the Battle of Glorieta Pass, Sibley’s army retreated to Santa Fe and began straggling into Albuquerque, where they commandeered La Glorieta, the already old hacienda that was owned by German entrepreneur Franz Huning.

Col. E.R.S. Canby

Meanwhile, Col. Canby, whose troops had been bottled up in Fort Craig and living on half rations, moved his men north, leaving Kit Carson and his New Mexico Volunteers to defend the fort. On April 8, Canby arrived at the small farming settlement of Barelas, south of Albuquerque. Scouting reports informed him that the main Rebel force had not yet arrived from Santa Fe and only a small group of Confederates held the town.

Canby decided to use his four pieces of artillery to make what he called a “noisy demonstration.” Rebel cannons returned fire from Huning's grist mill, which was located near what is now the intersection of Laguna and Central. The artillery duel lasted for several hours until a delegation of concerned citizens approached Canby under a white flag. They explained that Sibley had refused to allow the town’s women and children to evacuate, and the Union shelling was endangering them. Rather than risk public opinion in a territory that wasn’t wholly supportive of American rule, Canby ordered his men to stop firing, ending the Battle of Albuquerque.

The townspeople and the Confederates didn’t know it was over, however. They waited anxiously as the sunset glowed red, orange and pink. In the fading light, the yellow glow of Canyby’s campfires dotted the horizon. Union buglers, drummers and fifers played “Tattoo” marking the end of the day, then continued with more music as, gradually, the campfires died out. It wasn’t until morning that it became apparent that Canby and his troops had slipped away in the darkness, leaving the musicians and the campfires to cover their movement.
Unwilling to face Sibley’s entire army, which might reach Albuquerque at any moment, Canby had moved his men eastward into the Sandia Mountains. A few days later in the little village of San Antonio, he met up with the Colorado volunteers now under the command of John Chivington. Now, he thought, his troops were large enough to resume the attack on Gen. Sibley.

The howitzer replicas, Old Town Albuquerque

But Sibley’s forces had left Albuquerque, ending a possible second act of the Battle of Albuquerque. The General had arrived in Albuquerque soon after the artillery exchange and explained to his officers that, with only enough food for 15 days and no more than 40 rounds of ammunition per man, the best course of action would be to retreat down the Rio Grande valley and return to Texas. So that they couldn’t be used against his retreating troops, he had eight brass howitzers buried in a corral behind San Felipe Neri Church. On the morning of April 12, Sibley abandoned his wounded and proceeded south. The two armies would not encounter each other until two days later, at the Battle of Peralta.

Although hardly a battle, the artillery duel is the only battle ever to be fought within the city limits of Albuquerque. The eight brass howitzers were later recovered, and two are preserved in The Albuquerque Museum and replicas of the guns stand around the edges of Albuquerque's Old Town Plaza..

Jennifer Bohnhoff taught New Mexico history at Desert Ridge and Edgewood Middle Schools, in central New Mexico. She is now a full time author and lecturer. Rebels Along the Rio Grande is her trilogy of historical fiction set in New Mexico, and is suitable for middle grade through adult readers. Where Duty Calls and The Worst Enemy are already published. The third and final book in the trilogy, The Famished Country, will be released in October. The Battle of Albuquerque will be depicted in that book.

]]><![CDATA[Where Have All The Soldiers Gone?]]>Sun, 24 Mar 2024 17:42:52 GMThttps://jenniferbohnhoff.com/thin-air-my-blog-about-writing-and-my-books/where-have-all-the-soldiers-gone

Mike, the interpreter

Yesterday I went up to Pecos National Historic Park to attend a talk commemorating the 162nd anniversary of the Battle of Glorieta Pass.
The Battle, which took place March 26-28, 1862, is often called "The Gettysburg of the West." The man who gave the talk,a National Park employee (whose name I believe was Mike, but I didn't write it down and wasn't sure of by the time I got home) who came down from Fort Union,was in authentic Civil War dress. He gave a very nice synopsis of the battle, then a demonstration of his Springfield rifle, both of which the crowd of forty or so appreciated.

But it wasn't what I'd hoped for.

Union reenactors in Escondido in February, 2022.

It used to be that every year, on the weekend closest to March 26-28, the Park would sponsor a reenactment of the Battle of Glorieta. Groups of reenactors, most in meticulously researched and authentic dress, would set up camps, one for the Confederate forces and one for the Union forces. All weekend, tourists could wander among the tents asking questions and learning what life was like for the soldiers, merchants and camp women.

Ken Dusenbery and I at an Albuquerque convention for Social Studies teachers in 2014.

My connection to all this was a wonderful man named Ken Dusenbery. Ken, a veteran of the Vietnam war, was fascinated with military history. He was Corporal in the Artillery Company of New Mexico, a group of reenactors who took their jobs very seriously. Ken knew a lot about the life and times of the Civil War soldier and could tell you more about ammunition and "grub" than just about anyone alive. He read both Where Duty Calls and The Worst Enemy for me before they were published and helped me to get the details right.

Ken has since passed away, leaving a big hole in my heart. I miss his knowledge and the kind way he corrected my errors. I regret he wasn't able to read through book 3 of the series, The Famished Country, which comes out this fall.

The last time I saw Ken was in March of 2022, at Pecos National Historical Park. That time, there were both Confederate and Union camps, and tourists got to wander through the tents asking questions. Ken's company brought their howitzer, which was fired off to great applause. Many of the reenactors had their weapons with them and were happy to show them to interested people, but weapons were not the only things of interest. I remember my mother asking about the tar bucket that hung from one of the wagons. Others asked about the cooking implements and the portable writing desk. And my favorite memory from the day was the youngest Union soldier, the son of a reenactor who was proudly participating for the first time.

But there were no reenacted battles that year. Ken explained to me that the Park Service no longer wanted battles on their property. One ranger told me it was the gunsmoke that people complained of. Another said it was the glorification of war.

This year, the commemoration was distilled into just one person: Mike. He gave a great speech and fired three volleys, plus one more for an encore. But I missed the camps filled with men and women who've immersed themselves in the everyday life of the period and were so enthusiastic to share their knowledge with the rest of us.

Jennifer Bohnhoff is a retired history and language arts teacher who is now writing full time. You can read more about here and her books on her website.

]]><![CDATA[Albuquerque Historical Site: La Glorieta]]>Thu, 14 Mar 2024 06:00:00 GMThttps://jenniferbohnhoff.com/thin-air-my-blog-about-writing-and-my-books/albuquerque-historical-site-la-glorieta

https://sah-archipedia.org/buildings/NM-01-001-0089

La Glorieta has seen a lot of history. Albuquerque’s only surviving example of a Spanish Colonial hacienda, it was later owned by one of people who helped transform the town from a sleepy village to a railroad town.

In 1662, a soldier from Mexico City named Diego de Trujillo established a hacienda near what would later become Albuquerque’s Old Town. The house was damaged in 1680, when the Pueblo Revolt forced its occupants to flee the territory. The owners returned after 1692, during the period called the Reconquista, and rebuilt their home. The north and east wings of the twelve room, one-story adobe building that still stands might possibly date from this period.

In 1861, Franz Huning, a German immigrant who had opened a mercantile in Albuquerque’s Old Town, bought the property from the Franciscans. In addition to the eight-room hacienda, which Huning named La Glorieta, Spanish for arbor, the property included 700 acres of fields on which Huning grew crops. He added south and west wings to the house, creating a fully enclosed patio at its center. He also built a sawmill and a gristmill on the property.

Huning’s mercantile business depended on goods that he brought in along the Santa Fe Trail from Missouri. He was in St. Louis on business when, in 1862, the retreating Confederate Army of New Mexico, under the command of Major General Henry Hopkins Sibley, occupied La Glorieta. The officers lived in the home while the enlisted men camped in the nearby fields. The Confederates fired their cannons from the grounds of the gristmill during the artillery duel that became known as the Battle of Albuquerque.

https://www.albuqhistsoc.org/programs/ahs-2014-2015-programs/postwar-transformation-albuquerque-1945-1972/erna-fergusson/

Huning returned to Albuquerque in 1864 with a new wife, Ernestine Franke. They lived in La Glorieta for nineteen years, until 1883, when he built a new mansion, Castle Huning, down the street. In 1887 he deeded La Glorieta to his eldest daughter Clara as a wedding present when she married a local attorney named Harvey Butler Fergusson. They raised four children, including author Erna Fergusson, who has an Albuquerque Public Library named after her.

In 1940, Ruth Hanna McCormick Simms, a former Illinois congresswoman, bought

La Glorieta to house Manzano Day School, a private elementary school that she had started two years earlier. She had moved to Albuquerque after marrying local businessman and former New Mexico congressman, Albert Gallatin Simms, and established the school to provide an education for her daughter and the children of other prominent families.
Today, La Glorieta houses the administrative offices of the school. It is closed to the public, but tours and visits can be arranged by appointment

Jennifer Bohnhoff is an author and educator who lives in the mountains east of Albuquerque. She is presently working on The Famished Country, the third book in Rebels Along the Rio Grande, a trilogy of middle grade historical novels set in New Mexico during the Civil War. Where Duty Calls, the first book in the series, was published by Artemesia Press, and was published in May 2022. The second book, The Worst Enemy, was published in 2023. Both were finalists for Western Writers of America's spur award, and the first has also won the NM Book Award and the EVVY.

]]><![CDATA[Time to Play Ball Again]]>Thu, 07 Mar 2024 20:09:33 GMThttps://jenniferbohnhoff.com/thin-air-my-blog-about-writing-and-my-books/time-to-play-ball-again

My husband at a game (because I take the pictures and am bad at selfies!)

March is here, and that means wind and freakish weather and the promise of baseball. Before we know it, spring training will be over and my husband will be glued to the tube watching his favorite teams.

And I do mean teams, with an s. Instead of rooting for just one team, my husband roots for the entire National League Central Division. The son of a strong St. Louis fan, he will cheer for the Pirates or the Cubs (and the Twins, even though they're American League. Me? I pick a few good looking young kids with funny batting stances to cheer for each year. Often, I cheer for the catchers on whatever team's playing.

And if you asked me to name a player, you'd get a mix of current players from a lot of different teams and players from long ago. I can't remember who plays for the Dodgers now versus who played for them when they were still in Brooklyn. Really, I'm just there for the beer and the crowd.

So it should come as no surprise that I love books that combine baseball and historical fiction. Last spring I wrote a whole list of baseball books for middle grade readers, many of which were set in the past. Recently I've found two new additions to add to my list. They'll delight the baseball fan, and they'll give a glimpse into the past at the same time. That's a win-win to me, especially since both books feature teams from the National League's Central Division!

Both books were recently published by Kinkajou Press, an imprint of Artemesia Publishing, LLC that was created in 2007 to publish early reader, mid-grade, and young adult fiction. Artemesia also publishes titles for adults, including some really interesting baseball fiction, nonfiction and biography.

Click the titles below to find the books on Bookshop.org.

Walter Steps Up To The Plate

It's 1927, and all twelve-year-old Walter wants is to hang out with his friends and go to Wrigley Field to watch his beloved Cubs play. Unfortunately, his mother develops tuberculosis, and he must accompany her west, where the air is drier and thinner and she has a hope of recovery. Walter finds himself boarding with his aunt, uncle, and a spoiled cousin who's not happy to share his room. The cost of caring for his mother is steep, but Walter steps up to the plate and takes on a job delivering newspapers. He encounters Al Capone, who just might be the answer to his family's financial straits, but at the price of Walter's integrity. This is a sweet story that will immerse readers into Albuquerque when it was still a small and dusty town. They'll also learn a lot about the Great Depression. And while the times were different, young readers will understand and root for this scrappy young protagonist.

The Batboy and the Unbreakable Record

It's 1938, and 12 year old Richie Goodwin' is facing an awful summer because his dad has broken his leg and Richie has to get a job to help support the family. But when he gets his dream job -- batboy for the Cincinnati Reds -- his life goes from miserable to fantastic. Richie's smart mouth and unwillingness to follow rules gets him in trouble, and he has to deal with bullies, but he learns his lessons and is able to stick around to see Johnny Vander Meer make history -- and set a record that might never be broken! If you don't know (I didn't!) both Johnny Vander Meer and his unbreakable record are real, not fiction. This is a great book for baseball loving boys, middle grade readers of historical fiction, and anyone who wants to see a boy make good in a difficult situation.

I've got one copy of each book, and now that I've read and enjoyed them, I'd like to pass them on. If you'd like either book, leave a comment. Tell me which one and why, and I may choose you!

Jennifer Bohnhoff is a former educator who enjoys eating hotdogs and crackerjack and sitting next to her husband in ballparks. She is the author of a number of middle grade and adult books, many of them historical fiction. Kinkajou Press published two of the middle grade novels in her Rebels on the Rio Grande Trilogy: Where Duty Calls and The Worst Enemy. The third novel, The Famished Country, will come out this fall. A novel set in New Mexico 11,000 years ago, In the Shadow of Sunrise, is scheduled for release by Kinkajou next spring.

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