The Harwood Family
The first American Harwoods came to Concord, Massachusetts from Britain in the mid-1600�s. �The Winslow-Harwood History� says of the Harwoods that �most were farming families although they include one sea captain, representatives in the state legislature, a member in the constitutional convention of 1779, and many town officials. Many men served in the French and Indian Wars, the Revolutionary War, and the Civil War...clearly, no family has a better claim to participation in the settlement and building of the rural communities of Massachusetts� (Lebourveau family collection).
George Washington Harwood (1841 � 1920)
From G.W. Harwood�s obituary: �Mr. Harwood had the training of the typical New England boy, grew up to the habits of industry, learned the lessons of the district schools, and at the age of 20 enlisted in Company E of the Thirty-sixth Massachusetts infantry.� George Washington Harwood spent his early years farming and attending North Brookfield Congregational Church. He enlisted in the army August 12, 1862 and remained in service until June 8, 1865.
From Harwood�s obituary: �He saw three years of hard service. He was in some of the greatest campaigns of the war. At Jackson, Miss., during the Vicksburg campaign, he was wounded, and again was wounded at Campbell�s Station in Tennessee. He went in as a private and came out as a lieutenant.�
Harwood�s wounds, promotions, and daily impressions are all detailed in the letters included here, written over his three years in the army. His writing style is unusual for an officer; coming from a family of �moderate circumstances,� Harwood did not have the gentleman�s education that lent to flowery speech. He is pragmatic, continually asking about the farm and evaluating his future career and marriage options, not poetic but truthful in his descriptions of war.
This collection is also unique in its level of preserved detail; almost every letter he wrote still exists and is typed out here. By circumstance, only two other sets of hands have kept these letters between George�s lifetime and mine.
How the letters came to me:
George Washington Harwood married his distant cousin, Mary N. Harwood, and the two never produced children. Before his death George gave his letter collection to his favorite grand-niece, Frances Doane. She was named after George�s younger sister, reflecting the strong bond between her parents, grandparents and George. Frances Doane Martin died without direct heirs, but as she watched my grandparents John and Marion Spencer Lebourveau diligently collect family history, she decided they should inherit the letters. John�s and Marion�s families are linked to the Doanes and the Harwoods in many ways; John is the great-grandnephew of George Washington Harwood and the second cousin of Frances Doane; Marion�s mother was a close life-long friend of Frances Doane. Frances Doane and my great-grandmother, Bertha Spencer, grew up together in North Brookfield, Massachusetts, and the two later gave concerts showcasing Frances as vocalist and Bertha as pianist. My family still owns two summer cottages in Brookfield, and I draw on sweet memories of vacations there when I imagine George�s life in the 1800�s.
North Brookfield
Although the Batcheller shoe and boot factory, the main business of George�s time, was probably the largest operation of its kind in the world, it is now out of business. The building still stands among many original houses that have been used as cottages or improved for modern families. The North Brookfield Congregational Church is central to the history of this area; debates over its location created the separate towns of North and East Brookfield, and some members later became so full of abolitionist fervor that they created their own Union Church. After the war, the Union church members re-entered their original congregations, and their descendants still attend the North Brookfield church.
A note on method:
Frances Doane was right to think the letter collection would be well-preserved with my grandparents; they say they �felt these letters were true treasures, and therefore typed them all, word for word, in order to keep them for posterity.�
At times those words are difficult to understand, even when legible. Please forgive George for phonetic spelling; even at the highest levels of education, grammar was less regulated in the 1800�s than it is now. I have included a glossary for difficult spellings and dialectical words. I have footnoted some obscure references and included some maps and charts, but my main goal has been to let Harwood tell his own story, uninterrupted. I was inspired by Russel Duncan�s �limited tampering� in his edition of Col. Robert Shaw�s letters when I started my research. Not inclined to read military history, I was wary of reading about battles, but became drawn into Shaw�s story as a travelogue and social commentary in first person. Small details make all the difference, such as George�s letter that begins �tea is $4 lb. in this city.� His details also give the excitement of soldiering, for example in this letter �I hope you can read this I am sitting in a trench writing on the back of a Rebel Morning Report that just blew over the enemy lines.� What emerges is a picture of a man who wins the battles of disease, deprivation, sorrow and danger, and who emerges with some hope for a better future.