Author: Louis Hensel
Publisher: Jo-An Pictures Limited
Published: 2012-10-31
Total Pages: 350
ISBN-13: 9781890719135
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Louis Hensel was born in 1817 and lived a life of travel and adventure, as colorfully described in these letters to his granddaughter. This book is skillfully translated by Sigrid Wilshinsky from the Suderlein German handwriting into modern English. Hensel worked and traveled from Germany to France and Holland and finally arrived in New York City in 1848. On his first day in Manhattan, he sought and found a job and began working as a carver of artistic ivory pieces in an Art Shop. He later moved to Long Island to become a farmer. His very realistic descriptions of adventures with animals and people give a spellbinding view of his life and events. At the onset of the Civil War, he entered the Cavalry regiment in Brooklyn as an Officer and Master of the Horse. Later, Hensel spent many years traveling with the German Opera Company of New York which performed city to city, from New Orleans to St. Paul, where he vividly describes a wanton destruction and disruption of Southern cities in the path of the War. Hensel had the opportunity to meet President Abraham Lincoln which facilitated a visit to the White House on March 27, 1863, where Lincoln greeted representatives of the Cheyenne, Kiowa, Arapaho, Comanche, Apache and Caddo Tribes in the East room of the White House. This meeting is mentioned in an edition of The Atlanta Century of March 29th 1863. The eye-witness report by Hensel, of this meeting, to our knowledge, has never been revealed before. Hensel ended his years as a music teacher in the town of Hawley, PA as his base. His insightful recollections and description of country life and changing society takes one back in History as if one is being spoken to through time by Hensel, himself. His fascinating letters tell an exciting and inspiring story about surviving in America before, during and after the Civil War era that one can easily relate to in today’s times.
