Southern Voices
Evanston Review
October 4, 2007
Dorothy Andries, Michael Bonesteel, and Sara Burrows
His maternal ancestors were in the Confederate Army, and William Farina of Evanston remembers hearing Civil War stories that had been passed down through the generations. “My mother’s family in Georgia all came out for the worse,” he said. “As a kid I thought the tales were exaggerated, but when I was doing research, I learned that many family stories were true.” The result is Farina’s book, Ulysses S. Grant, 1861-1864. Two of Farina’s great-grandfathers and one great-great grandfather were in the Battle of Sharpsburg (Antietam), the bloodiest day of the Civil War. “We have big family pictures with no men in them,” he said. “In some ways, this is an anti-war book.” Farina will present a slide show of his family’s photos and talk about his book at 7p.m. Oct. 8 at the Evanston Public Library.
(Farina’s Ulysses S. Grant, 1861-1864 was named by the Evanston Review as one of eleven notable books by local authors.)