| My upbringing was in a strict Protestant family. | | | | not control the story, it wrote itself. In my heart I |
| With a father like Lyman Beecher, who was | | | | believed it was written by God, using me as an |
| considered one of the leading religious orators of | | | | instrument.As a published author, I was afforded |
| the times, I had no recourse but to be bestowed | | | | the opportunity to travel to England and the |
| the heritage of religious ethics. Our entire family | | | | Continent. I made several sojourns there and |
| was imbued with holy rights and unholy wrongs. | | | | delighted in the hospitality. I had never been in |
| Father was most adamant about his views. He | | | | robust health and the sea voyage always rallied |
| was strongly pro Calvinism, and believed firmly in | | | | me. Perhaps it was the sea air, or perhaps it was |
| equality of all men.Another ethic I embraced at an | | | | the time away from the continual demands of |
| early age was work. No one ever put in longer | | | | my life.My son Charles claimed that President |
| hours helping around the house, studying, | | | | Lincoln looked down at me with his coal nugget |
| writing and teaching than I. My sister Catherine | | | | eyes and said, "so this is the lady who started the |
| relied on me to assist her at the school for girls, | | | | great war!". I don't recall the incident,but Charles |
| which she founded.When I married Professor | | | | was with me the day I met Mr. Lincoln. If it was |
| Calvin Stowe, the widower of one of my dearest | | | | said, it is a terrible accusation to put on anyone. |
| friends, I had already seen several of my short | | | | True, my book, "Uncle Tom's Cabin", did stir up |
| stories published in magazines. For me, writing was | | | | the hornet's nest, but the seeds of unrest were |
| a compulsion. It was not unusual for a friend or | | | | planted and a divided nation had been the harvest |
| relative to receive 10 or 20 page letters from me. | | | | before it had been written.I never felt that I had |
| I poured out my feelings with intensity.My brother, | | | | a hand in bring about the Civil War. The only |
| Henry Ward, who as my father also became a | | | | contribution I might have made was in my letters |
| renowned minister, was bombarded with my | | | | to some of the noted women of England, enlisting |
| epistles of soul rendering prose. Within me | | | | their help to being about Britain's support of the |
| screamed the Muse who could not be stilled. I | | | | government of President Lincoln. I was not anti |
| wrote until my hand ached, my mind wearied, and | | | | the South. I thought the people were kind and |
| my thoughts finally stilled by pure exhaustion.I | | | | genteel and that the practice of slavery occurred |
| was deeply disturbed by the slavery issue. My | | | | only because it had been part of their heritage.To |
| father convinced me at an early age that all men | | | | be politically minded was never my first cause. My |
| are created equal. This conviction led to his | | | | religious values were paramount in all of my |
| ultimate ouster from the Church he loved so | | | | novels. It was my belief that God is all love, and |
| dearly. The prevailing attitude in many of the | | | | thus, all are loved by God. That we should treat |
| Protestant churches was that there were classes | | | | each other with humanity, justice, and love was |
| of society and each should act accordingly.This | | | | my foremost philosophy.On the occasion of my |
| attitude was unthinkable to me. In my later years | | | | seventy first birthday in 1882, at a party in my |
| I realized that people are classed by their own | | | | honor, I reticently gave a speech where I stated |
| attitudes, perhaps brought on by the prevailing | | | | my feelings about life with the comment, "Let us |
| mode of society, but no one should ever be | | | | never doubt. Everything that ought to happen is |
| enslaved by another. Race, creed, economics, or | | | | going to happen". And so it did in my life, so it |
| academic quality should not be used to denigrate | | | | does in yours.If I were to live in these times, I |
| any of God's creation. I firmly believed that | | | | would entreat you to be mindful of the good in |
| education was the primary means of ending this | | | | your neighbor so that your neighbor will find the |
| injustice.My joy in life was always my family. My | | | | good in you.Mary Bradley McCauley is a writer in |
| children were my first priority, and the loss of | | | | no particular genre. Her articles, short stories, |
| two sons devastated me. Each time I buried | | | | essays, poems, travel bits, and 'thinking about' |
| myself in my work and wrote with unceasing | | | | series have been published and well received.Her |
| vigor. In my writing I could lose myself and ease | | | | metaphysical novel, "The House of Annon" has |
| the pain.Many of the stories I wrote had been | | | | been one of her writing highlights.After the |
| serialized in magazines before they were published | | | | nomadic life of the military with it's countless |
| in books. I had become known as a writer of | | | | moves, and a career in travel taking her to the |
| essays and articles prior to Uncle Tom's Cabin, | | | | Bering Sea in Alaska, the Opera House in Sydney, |
| which by the way I wrote and sent chapters | | | | most of the major islands in the Caribbean as well |
| weekly to the National Era magazine. I had | | | | as several trips to Europe, Ms. McCauley recently |
| planned to complete the story in six months, but | | | | moved from Florida to Franklin TN.A former |
| it grew and grew and was finished in a year. I | | | | Army Brat, Army Wife and Group Tour Travel |
| never expected it to make such an impact. That | | | | Advisor, she claims her first love is being with her |
| it was ultimately printed in forty languages | | | | grandchildren and second is communicating in any |
| overwhelms me. I frequently stated that I could | | | | way, shape or form. |