True to His Country: A Civil War Novel

"From a soldier true to his country" is how Charles L. Taylor signed his letter home after fighting in his first battle of the Civil War at Roanoke Island, North Carolina in February 1862. Rick Cochran crafts a compelling story based on his letters, a diary and decades of research. This historical novel follows the lives of the author's great-grandparents. Charlotte Scales was an Irish immigrant who was orphaned at eight when her parents died on the ship to America. She became the foster child of Jay & Julia Filley, the most prominent citizens of Bloomfield, Connecticut. In 1858, at sixteen, she married Chales Lambert Taylor, a twenty-eight-year-old, previously divorced farmer, despite the objections of her foster mother. In 1861, Charles enlisted in the Tenth Connecticut Volunteer Infantry Regiment as a private. He fought for four years in scores of battles, survived typhoid fever, was wounded twice and rose to the rank 1st Sergeant of his company. This heart wrenching tale relates the progress and tragedy of the war as well as the worries of the daily life on the home front. This is a riveting tale of ordinary people living in the extraordinary times of our nation's greatest nightmare.