History for Young Readers

Numbering All the Bones by Ann Rinaldi
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I had the pleasure of unpacking 30 cartons of books for our English department yesterday, and borrowed this one for the weekend. I ended up reading it before breakfast this morning. A perfect way to start a lazy Saturday.

I'm giving this 4 stars because I think it has so much historical information in it for discussion.

Eulinda is her master's daughter, but lives in that strange window of being a little bit accepted by her father, but really belonging to the slave population. It is in the throes of the civil war, and everyone knows the South will lose, but the slaves have not been declared free as yet.

Near the plantation is the infamous Andersonville prison. There are many true facts about the prison woven into the story. 13,000 dead in Andersonville, did you know that? It was, in essence, as the author points out, a death camp where food, medicine and kindness were missing.

New learning for me was the fact that Mr. William Griffin, who was an ex-confederate, came to Andersonville Prison of his own accord, and, used his own money, to clean up and put to order the graves of those who died there (it was not protected and animals were disturbing the graves). Eventually Clara Barton and Mr. Griffin worked together to honor the dead. Dorence Atwater, whose job at  Andersonville was to record the dead, assisted them in identifying graves. Headstones were erected to mark the graves. Can you imagine recording thousands of dead people. One wonders how that would affect a life.

Eulinda's story, and that of her slave brothers, are the backdrop for the historical context.

As I think of the news in the world today, people being beheaded on the internet for all to see, the continued warring in the Middle East - I can't help but wonder with the Psalmist, "Lord, how long". God created us to live in peace, to live with compassion,kindness, humility, gentleness and patience (Colossians 3), we are doing a pretty miserable job of it!

It's good to remember that God raises up people like Clara Burton and William Griffin to help us get back on track.


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