week four on "Aurelia's journey"

Three more twelve-inch blocks on

"my journey"

to the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War...

Bear Paw:

 

House:

Four Star:

I really like all most of these blocks, too. 

The Bear Paw is a little "angry" looking...

(thanks, D~~~~, you have me thinking this now, too). 

Don't know if it's all of the points

or the combination of the points along with the color scheme of the block;

anyway, three more blocks down.

  

Next in the "A Path to the Civil War" book

is the applique dog block. 

It, too, is a twelve inch block,

so a really big dog (!)...

I'm thinking I will do something other than the big dog*.

Don't know what yet, but to me, the dog just doesn't "go".

Now, the history lesson:

Who would've guessed that
what started as 
a newspaper feature series for about a year (1851-1852)/
later collected to become 
the book
"Uncle Tom's Cabin", 
written by Harriet Beecher Stowe,
would have such an impact on the
United States sentiment about slavery (even having an international effect).

Ms. Beecher was born in Connecticut in 1811,
married Reverend Stowe to become Mrs. Beecher-Stowe, 
and moved to southern Ohio* in 1832,
where she taught at a school for former slave children.

About the same time as the passing of the Fugitive Slave act,
Mrs. Stowe's loss of one of her children (1849),
to the cholera epidemic made her feel for others who had also lost a child - 
much like a slave who had a child torn from their arms by bounty hunters.  

Mrs. Stowe portrayed her feelings
of loss and grief
in her story of a devout slave,
Uncle Tom,
 and she put a voice to the abuse, suffering and even death 
of slaves in the United States at this time in history.

By 1856,
2,000,000
(yes, that's TWO MILLION)
of her books had sold. 
The outraged southerners proclaimed that the book
was an exaggeration of the slaves abuse and plight.
Mrs. Stowe responded by giving newspapers documentation of the abuse in the South. 
The response was also strong in England. 
So much so, that
the British declined
to aid the South 
when the War started.

*Maybe I will do my own block-- something to tie in MY family history of the southern-Ohio Rankin House.  Just thinkin'...