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Title: Affectionately, Rachel: Letters from India, 1860-1884 by Rachel Kerr Johnson, Barbara Mitchell Tull ISBN: 0-87338-463-6 Publisher: Kent State University Press Pub. Date: 01 December, 1992 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $35.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 5 (1 review)
Rating: 5
Summary: How did this mid-1800's farm-girl ends up in India?
Comment: While this true-life story can't compete with the constant thrill-a-minute excitement level of a fictional Tom Clancy novel, the wonderful realities and historical remembrances portrayed here provide a down-to-earth documentation well worth a few hours of your time. The editor provides a unique and historically accurate documentary of the little-known life of her great-grand-mother, Rachel Kerr, mostly from her great-grand-mother's own hand. Rachel was a young farm-girl who married a minister and spent much of her life as a missionary's wife in India in the mid-1800's, far from the family she loved so much. The editor initially provides informative and interesting historical background material about Rachel's youth while growing up in and around Hookstown, Pennsylvania. Hookstown is a very small cross-roads town located in hilly farm-country about 30 miles west of Pittsburgh near the state border with West Virginia. The details of her life in this area can be easily verified through numerous government and individual archive records available today. Even many of the physical locations in and around Hookstown can still be easily traced and located today. Hookstown has now grown a little bit and is an interesting place to visit; but it still remains an out-of-the-way place which doesn't put much stock in trying to keep up with the hectic pace of the rest of the world. After the background has been properly set, the editor then smoothly brings in the real meat of the story through incorporation of an extensive verbatim series of letters written personally by Rachel, coupled with historical commentary where needed. These original letters provide an unusual personal and emotional insight into Rachel's exciting but challenging life as a mother and as a missionary's wife in the extremely dangerous and difficult environment of mid-eighteenth century India. The brief story of how the editor encountered her great-grand-mother's letters is itself a fascinating one. The stories these letters tell bring a real-life perspective to us that the movies have never touched. I became particularly attached to the book when I found out that the subject is my great-great aunt, that all the people she describes are my relatives, and that I grew up in her hometown locale. I also have a large, beautiful cross-stitch done by Rachel Kerr in 1848 at the age of 12. I always cherished that cross-stitch, even as a little boy, but, until I read this book, I only knew that Rachel Kerr was somehow related to me. I found the same beauty and sensitivity in this book that I always admired in that cross-stitch and it confirms to me what a wonderfully bright, talented, and unique person this lady truly was. Richard Hobbs
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