Her own son was among the first to enlist when Lincoln called for volunteers. “Would you have men say that Harriet Beecher Stowe’s son is a coward?” he replied to a question about his going. And she received him back from Gettysburg with a wound in his head from which he never recovered. From morning till night, all the days of the week, throughout the war Mrs. Stowe worked steadily. Years before she had written an appeal to the women of America, setting forth the injustice and misery of slavery, begging them to work together to have the system abolished. And when a strong party arose in England favoring the South, she wrote another appeal to her sisters there, which helped to crystallize public sentiment in favor of abolition and the North, to stop the English talk of recognizing the independence of the confederacy and of mediation. Its effect on the press and on Parliament was at once evident, and all over the kingdom resolutions were passed for the Union. During the trying days of reconstruction she worked to secure full rights for the freedmen. Living in Florida for the winters, and in Connecticut in the summers, both north and south she helped to educate the negroes whom she had helped to free. She still wrote well for many years, though she never achieved another exceptional success. Thirty books in all she published, some of them admirable, and then claimed a release from active service, saying she had written all her thoughts. But had Uncle Tom been her only hero, still would she live in the history of our country as foremost in the movement against slavery. CHAPTER XII JULIA WARD HOWE 1819-1910 Julia Ward was born in New York City, and lived most of her life there and in Boston. Her father was a wealthy banker, with a fine sense of American noblesse oblige. Her mother, a woman of scholarly tastes, died when Julia was only five. Mr. Ward gave his children every possible advantage--lessons in French and Italian and music, as well as the best English education; and the three daughters had as good a training as the three sons. Julia was an unusual child with a wonderful memory, and learned very quickly. She wrote poems, solemn poems, when a very little girl. At nine she listened at school to recitations in Italian and handed the amazed instructor a composition in that language asking to be allowed to join the class--and this request was granted, though the other pupils were twice her age. Life was a serious thing to this child who was brought up very strictly, with duty and dignity constantly impressed upon her. She heard frequently stories of her ancestors--colonial governors, Revolutionary officers, Nathaniel Greene, and Marion, the “swamp fox of Carolina,”--the long line passed before the grave little girl, terrible as an army with banners; but always with the trumpet call of inspiration in the thought that they belonged to her.