Brown Bag Speaker Series at Hitchcock Academy
Hitchcock Hosts its Next Brown Bag Talk:
Letters Unlock First-Hand Accounts
of a Brimfield Family During the Civil War
The next installation in the Hitchcock Brown Bag Speaker Series features a talk on a collection of Civil War letters discovered at Hitchcock nearly 150 years after their writing. The correspondence is an intimate account of a Brimfield family during the war, penned by a farmer-turned-captain serving in the South and his wife at home in the Northeast. The letters inspired the book “Trying to Do My Duty: The Civil War Letters of Captain Francis D. Lincoln and Rebecca Cox Lincoln,” edited by Koren (Kitty) Lowenthal and her late husband, Larry Lowenthal (1940-2020). Lowenthal will present her talk on Wednesday, May 21 at 12:30pm with an optional lunch served prior at 12pm.
Captain Lincoln was a prominent figure in Brimfield history. He was instrumental in having the town’s Civil War monument erected and the town library bears his name.
In 1862, a volunteer company of men (46th Massachusetts Regiment) from Brimfield, Holland, Monson, and Wales, all towns in Hampden County, answered the call to save the Union and served in North Carolina under their elected captain, Brimfield farmer Francis D. Lincoln.
Lincoln regularly corresponded through letters with his wife Rebecca Cox Lincoln. For over a hundred years, the Lincoln letters lay forgotten until they were rediscovered at Hitchcock.
The remarkable correspondence reveals the trials of men at war and far from home, and the lives and pain of the families they left behind. The frank and open relationship of the couple, their sensibility and sense of humor, and their sharp intellect illuminate a chapter of the nation’s great struggle.
Both the soldier’s perspective and the life of the spouse left behind at the homestead are presented, providing a unique opportunity to follow the plight of a couple affected by the nation at war.
Kitty will reflect on the significance of the correspondence, which explores both the intimate world of small-town Massachusetts and the camp life of a volunteer company of men thrown into the turmoil of the Civil War.
Reservations are required. Lunch (optional) will include a half sandwich, soup, and beverage. Participants may also bring in their own lunch. The fee for the talk is $10, or $20 with lunch. Lunch registration closes on May 20 at noon. This program is presented with support from The Shirley Frye Memorial Fund.
For more information, visit www.hitchcockacademy.org. Hitchcock Academy is a community center located at 2 Brookfield Road in Brimfield serving the community with educational, recreational, and cultural programming.
