With Great Sorrow: A Civil War Story (Paddy series)
Rosaleen and Emmet are part of a community of Irish immigrants who have come to Massachusetts seeking a better life. In late 1861, Emmet joins the Irish Brigade and leaves to do his duty in the Civil War. The Irish community generally supports the war effort, but many are uncertain whether emancipation of Southern slaves is in the best interests of the Irish people. Rosaleen adopts her alter ego “Paddy” to rally Irish support for Lincoln’s war as well as for emancipation.
Rosaleen is a memorable female protagonist, talented and confident, imbued with a keen sense of humanity and love of family, brave, and fiercely determined upon setting her course of action. The novel doesn’t shy away from intense military action when Rosaleen’s husband Emmet experiences the horrors of battle at Fredericksburg, The Wilderness, and Spotsylvania Courthouse, where he is captured and then held in squalid conditions at a South Carolina prison camp. Rosaleen burns to reunite with Emmet and is presented with an opportunity to become a cotton buyer in the Deep South, which might bring her closer to him. Can she compromise on her personal convictions for the love of family?
With Great Sorrow is book three in the author’s Paddy series and is a well-researched, welcome addition to Civil War period historical fiction with its faithful tracking of historical events, not only in battle, but also unrest in the Irish community at home in Massachusetts, and enigmatic cotton trading in the occupied Southern states.
