On the first day of the Battle of Gettysburg in July 1863, Union artillery lieutenant Bayard Wilkeson fell while bravely spurring his men to action. His father, Sam, a New York Times correspondent, was already on his way to Gettysburg when he learned of his son’s wounding but had to wait until the guns went silent before seeking out his son, who had died at the town’s poorhouse. Sitting next to his dead boy, Sam Wilkeson then wrote one of the greatest battlefield dispatches in American history. This vivid exploration of one of Gettysburg’s most famous stories--the story of a father and a son, the son’s courage under fire, and the father’s search for his son in the bloody aftermath of battle--reconstructs Bayard Wilkeson’s wounding and death, which have been shrouded in myth and legend, and sheds light on Civil War–era journalism, battlefield medicine, and the “good death.”
In 1884, twenty-three-year-old Corabelle Fellows left her family in Washington, DC, and journeyed out West to teach Native children in Nebraska and Dakota Territory. She hoped her missionary work would improve the lives of the Dakota and Lakota Sioux people by helping them assimilate into white culture, following the predominant government policy at the time. But after years of living among the Native people, it was Cora’s perceptions of life, love, and faith that were transformed. It began with her friendship with Elizabeth Winyan, a remarkable Dakota woman who was a model of strength, compassion, and adaptability among her people. Winyan became a maternal figure for Cora in the strange land so far from the “civilized” city. She even saved Cora from being married against her will. Then Cora met Sam Campbell, a man from Scottish and Sioux stock. They fell in love and were married, though the match made national headlines after Cora’s family disowned her. The couple struggled to find a place in the American frontier, straddling two worlds. For years their marriage was grist for the yellow press, and they became a sensational national story that led them to a brief stint as a sideshow attraction for traveling exhibitions and dime museums to support themselves. They would never live happily ever after, and the couple was plagued by racist rhetoric and sexist slander even after their divorce. Life Painted Red details Cora’s experiences from her Washington, DC, exodus to her years living among the Sioux, and her scandalous, short-lived marriage to Sam Campbell.
In 1884, twenty-three-year-old Corabelle Fellows left her family in Washington, DC, and journeyed out West to teach Native children in Nebraska and Dakota Territory. She hoped her missionary work would improve the lives of the Dakota and Lakota Sioux people by helping them assimilate into white culture, following the predominant government policy at the time. But after years of living among the Native people, it was Cora’s perceptions of life, love, and faith that were transformed. It began with her friendship with Elizabeth Winyan, a remarkable Dakota woman who was a model of strength, compassion, and adaptability among her people. Winyan became a maternal figure for Cora in the strange land so far from the “civilized” city. She even saved Cora from being married against her will. Then Cora met Sam Campbell, a man from Scottish and Sioux stock. They fell in love and were married, though the match made national headlines after Cora’s family disowned her. The couple struggled to find a place in the American frontier, straddling two worlds. For years their marriage was grist for the yellow press, and they became a sensational national story that led them to a brief stint as a sideshow attraction for traveling exhibitions and dime museums to support themselves. They would never live happily ever after, and the couple was plagued by racist rhetoric and sexist slander even after their divorce. Life Painted Red details Cora’s experiences from her Washington, DC, exodus to her years living among the Sioux, and her scandalous, short-lived marriage to Sam Campbell.
On the first day of the Battle of Gettysburg in July 1863, Union artillery lieutenant Bayard Wilkeson fell while bravely spurring his men to action. His father, Sam, a New York Times correspondent, was already on his way to Gettysburg when he learned of his son’s wounding but had to wait until the guns went silent before seeking out his son, who had died at the town’s poorhouse. Sitting next to his dead boy, Sam Wilkeson then wrote one of the greatest battlefield dispatches in American history. This vivid exploration of one of Gettysburg’s most famous stories--the story of a father and a son, the son’s courage under fire, and the father’s search for his son in the bloody aftermath of battle--reconstructs Bayard Wilkeson’s wounding and death, which have been shrouded in myth and legend, and sheds light on Civil War–era journalism, battlefield medicine, and the “good death.”
Originally collected in Chuck Klosterman IV and now available both as a stand-alone essay and in the ebook collection Chuck Klosterman on Media and Culture, this essay is about video games.
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