This post by CFC Guest Blogger Suzanne Adair is part of her tour celebrating the release of her newest book. It had originally been scheduled to appear elsewhere, but that particular blog owner felt it was too controversial, especially in the wake of the tragic events in Boston. I assured Suzanne that CFC is not averse to controversy (we create enough on our own) and that we would welcome her, and what she had to share, with open arms.
Please welcome Suzanne Adair to CFC.
Award-winning novelist Suzanne Adair is a Florida native who lives in a two hundred-year-old city at the edge of the North Carolina Piedmont, named for an English explorer who was beheaded. Her suspense and thrillers transport readers to the Southern theater of the Revolutionary War, where she brings historic towns, battles, and people to life. She fuels her creativity with Revolutionary War reenacting and visits to historic sites. When she’s not writing, she enjoys cooking, dancing, hiking, and spending time with her family. A Hostage to Heritage, her next Michael Stoddard American Revolution thriller, was released in April 2013.
Blog and social media links:
Quarterly electronic newsletter: http://tinyletter.com/Suzanne-Adair-News
Web site: http://www.SuzanneAdair.com
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/Suzanne_Adair
***Suzanne is graciously offering a FREE copy of her new book, A Hostage to Heritage, in paperback, or one of a multiple number of ebook formats, to anyone (worldwide) who leaves a comment today—please specify your preferred format, and check back to see who the winner is. I will be totally responsible (along with LoML) for the selection.***
One of the most haunting images of
war around the globe is that of children holding semi-automatic weapons. In the
United States, these images shock a belief system. Children should be in
nurturing home environments, enjoying the company of friends after school,
taking clarinet lessons, playing softball. They should be allowed to be kids
and dream.
Enlisting children as soldiers permits conflict to continue
long after a desperate faction's supply of adult combatants has been exhausted.
The global costs are astronomical. According to Child Soldiers International, many children who
join armed groups volunteer. Their
reasons may be any of the following:
·
Survival
·
Poverty and lack of access to education or work
(thus the need for income)
·
Desire for power, status, and social recognition
·
Pressure from family or peers
·
Desire to honor a family tradition
·
Desire to escape domestic violence (and for
girls an arranged marriage)
Americans convince themselves that
such extreme measures happen elsewhere, in distant lands. But historically
America has inherited a legacy of children in the military that’s just as
horrific as modern conflicts with child soldiers. There were drummer boys on
battlefields, sailor boys on navy ships, and ragged children traveling with
armies as camp followers. Did these children escape the bullets and bayonets?
No.
Children don't escape war.
Two years into the American War of Independence, the fight
was going poorly for the Continentals. The Congress was determined to raise an
army of eighty-eight infantry regiments. Joseph Moseley answered Congress’s
recruitment call in March 1777 and enlisted as a Continental private in the newly
made 14th Virginia Regiment. Joseph had just turned twelve years old.
In the 14th Virginia, Private Joseph Moseley wore a uniform,
carried a firearm that was probably taller than he was, and was paid six and
two-thirds dollars per month. His two teenage brothers were also in the
regiment. Left behind at home were a mother widowed for eight years and a
brother and sister, both younger than ten years old.
Joseph was discharged in February
1778, just after his thirteenth birthday. During his year of service, his
regiment participated in major battles—Brandywine and Germantown—that were
losses for the Continentals. The regiment also endured winter camp at Valley
Forge. Joseph saw morale in the Continental Army at its lowest point, before
the French, the Spanish, the Dutch, and Baron von Steuben offered their aid and
changed the course of the war.
Joseph Moseley was my great, great, great-grandfather. Until
I conducted research for my membership in the Daughters of the American Revolution,
my family thought that Joseph had joined a militia unit as an older teen at the
end of the war and spent a year performing low-profile duties for the men:
gathering firewood, cleaning weapons, digging latrines. We were stunned by the
truth of a twelve-year-old in uniform who looked across battlefields at
hundreds of disciplined redcoats with fixed bayonets. My upcoming thriller, A
Hostage to Heritage, includes a sub-plot about child soldiers. Joseph has
earned his spot on the Acknowledgements page.
My ancestor’s reasons for enlisting are found in the
bulleted list, echoes of the reasons why children enlist today, a disconcerting
history lesson. Joseph and countless other children picked up the firearms of
dead men and continued the fight for the Continental Army. In doing so, they
extended armed conflict for six years. And since our "Revolutionary
War" was but one theater of a world war, the negative impact on the global
economy was staggering.
Nations and factions have been using child soldiers for
thousands of years. The effect on the children is obvious. Joseph and those who
fought at his side had no childhood. At the least, they suffered from some
degree of post-traumatic stress disorder for the rest of their lives, even if
they volunteered for duty and were discharged with no physical injuries.
Today's child soldiers in Africa, Asia, South America, and
the Middle East are all of humanity's casualties. They show us the costs of
war, no matter how hard we try to look elsewhere.
Is there a child soldier among your ancestors? What do you
think it will take to finally put an end to this horrific practice?
Book description:
A boy kidnapped for ransom. And a madman who didn't
bargain on Michael Stoddard's tenacity.
Spring 1781. The American Revolution enters its seventh
grueling year. In Wilmington, North Carolina, redcoat investigator Lieutenant
Michael Stoddard expects to round up two miscreants before Lord Cornwallis's
army arrives for supplies. But his quarries' trail crosses with that of a
criminal who has abducted a high-profile English heir. Michael's efforts to track
down the boy plunge him into a twilight of terror from radical
insurrectionists, whiskey smugglers, and snarled secrets out of his own past in
Yorkshire.
