Award winning historian Martha Hodes brings us into the extraordinary world of Eunice Connolly. Born white and poor in New England, Eunice moved from country to factory city, worked in the mills, and then followed her husband to the Deep South. When the Civil War came, Eunice’s brothers joined the Union army while her husband fought and died for
the Confederacy. Back in New England, a widow and the mother of two, Eunice barely got by as a washwoman, struggling with crushing depression. Four years later she fell in love with a black sea captain, married him, and moved to his home in the West Indies. Following every lead in a collection of 500 family letters, Hodes traces Eunice’s footsteps
and meet descendants along the way.
