Tonya Bolden’s latest is a simple and devastating novel based on an atrocity that took place near the end of the American Civil War, as General William Tecumseh Sherman’s Union Army closed in on the city of Savannah, Georgia. Newly freed slaves joined the Union soldiers on their march, men, women, and children who viewed the US Army as protection from Confederate forces eager to to return them to slavery. 

CROSSING EBENEZER CREEK begins as Mariah flees along with her younger brother Zeke when Union soldiers arrive at their former owner’s plantation after the fall of Atlanta. Amid the chaos of the harrowing trip south, she and other newly freed Blacks help the soldiers as best they can, preparing food, treating the wounded, anything they can do to assist the Army and further their own dreams of freedom. Caleb is driving a wagon for the Army, and he is immediately drawn to Mariah. Although he was raised a free man, Caleb is fleeing demons of his own, memories he keeps shielded by his calm and methodical ways. 

Bolden focuses on the community of former slaves on the march, rather than the Union Army or its military goal. Many of the freed Blacks are living with horrific memories of physical torture and psychological abuse they experienced at the hands of slave owners. Bolden describes their accounts of whippings and amputations and other abuse in spare and haunting language. Twin sisters tell how they were sold away from their family as small children and recall how their mother helped them memorize their family members’ names and where they were from before they were taken away, hoping that one day they might be reunited. 

Over the days of their journey, Caleb and Mariah allow themselves the beginnings of hope that they may find happiness together. After all, they travel with Captain Galloway whose every action toward the former slaves is protective and cordial. They realize that not all in the Union Army feel the same. One of the most feared is General Reb, real name Jefferson Davis, the same as the president of the Confederacy, who hates them and takes every opportunity to terrorize the freed slaves in the caravan. 

Finally all that seems to stand between these marchers and their future hopes is Ebenezer Creek about 20 miles from Savannah, a wide tributary whose waters run deep. Caleb, Mariah, Zeke, and all the others wait for the Union Army members to cross their hastily built bridge and listen to fire from approaching Confederate forces coming closer and closer.

I was born and raised in Georgia and consider myself well versed in its history, but the story of Ebenezer Creek is one I’d never read before. Tonya Bolden has done extraordinary research using historical sources that detail a shameful incident at the close of the Civil War. Books like CROSSING EBENEZER CREEK, however painful they may be to read, help us better understand our nation’s complex history, one in which blue Union uniforms may mask shades of gray.

When Mariah and Zeke are freed from their lives of slavery, they hope to make the long trip to freedom.  Mariah meets and befriends Caleb, a young free black man, and together they develop a friendship, speaking to each other about their hopes and dreams for the future.  But what neither one knows is that they are walking toward a future they could not imagine.  Bolden creates compelling, believable characters that the reader will want to see succeed, all the while providing subtle hints that they may face tragedy and danger ahead.  Recommended for fans of historical fiction.