I love Google and Wikipedia as much as the next guy, but if you are going to write historical fiction, you better be prepared to understand the facts and details from the era in which your story is set. This means you need to seek out lots of different sources of information. Research takes in a very broad range of activities.
Here is some of what I did:
- Researched genealogy through Ancestry.com and FamilySearch.org
- Researched military records through Fold3.com
- Talked with close and distant relatives. Including a number I’d never met before or hadn’t seen in many years.
- Collected old family photos.
- Studied Maude Phelps’s (gr grandmother) diaries along with photos and scrapbooks she made
- Reviewed maps and other Civil War materials at the Library of Congress (online)
- Toured Gettysburg National Military Park.
- Visited the cemetery in Hector, NY where Hattie, Arthur, and Charlotte are buried.
- Went to Hattie and Arthur’s farmhouse in Hector, NY and knocked on the door. The farm is now a winery.
- Studied dozens of Civil War resources online (including Wikipedia!). I list a bunch here.
Photos of the places I went and some of the things I found
Fruit crate stencil found while plowing the vineyard. It lay in the field for over 100 years.
NY 76 section of the Gettysburg Military Cemetery. Hannibal is likely buried here.
Arthur and Hattie’s grave
Jennie Howell’s (Hattie’s sister who died at age 12) grave in Hector
Hannibal and Charlotte’s grave in Hector. Hannibal isn’t buried there, or is he?
Hattie’s message to Arthur in his Autography Book dated 1882
Hattie and Arthur’s farmhouse 2016
My cousin Marie Jo Kob. She is the great great granddaughter of Hattie’s sister Martha. Note are noses are identical!
Hattie and Arthur’s farmhouse note the grape vines.
Hattie and Arthur’s farmhouse 1910
Meeting the owner of Hattie and Arthur’s farm in 2016
NY 76th Monument at Gettysburg. Likely place Hannibal was killed.
Charlotte Howell’s application for pension
Postcard sent from Byron Howell to Charlotte Howell concerning pension
Letter written from Bryon Howell to his younger brother Milo August 1885
Envelope from letter sent by Hannibal to his brother in law.
1850 Census
Hannibal Howell Letter
Hannibal Howell signature
Harriet Howell shortly before she died at age 65
Hattie as shortly before she died at age 65
Harriet Howell age 8?
Hattie age 8
Arthur – Earl- Harriet
Arthur, Earl, Hattie circa 1890