This post tells a story of how two families communicated during the Civil War when one was in the North and one was in the South.  This method of communication used the newspapers of each region to repost personal messages.  John Adams Converse (1803 – 1886), residing in Montreal, Canada in 1864, was a younger brother of the Rev. Augustus Lawrence Converse (1798 – 1860), who, as we know from previous posts in this blog, was the rector of Holy Cross Church in Stateburg, S.C., for many years.  Rev. Converse’s only daughter Katherine married John Napolean Frierson, and so the Reverend was also the maternal grandfather of his namesake, Charleston Light Dragoon A. Converse Frierson.  In May of 1864, when Converse was wounded, captured and sent to Point Lookout, Maryland, his Stateburg family must have certainly been worried about his health and safety.  John A. Converse was apparently the family’s contact in the North who was leading the search for the young Frierson.  The clipping below, apparently a re-post from the New York News from June 21, 1864, shows that John A. Converse has been contacted by his grand-nephew and told of his imprisonment at Point Lookout.  John Converse tells the family that he is on his way to see young Converse Frierson (click on the images to enlarge).

The next clipping gives details of their meeting, telling of Converse’s surprise at his good treatment by his captors, the supplies that John Converse has brought and that he will be returning to see the prisoner.  We are not sure of the actual time of this visit to Point Lookout, but the reference to Converse’s “chills and fever” at the beginning of the clipping could be an indication of the illness that brought on his death in the camp within a few weeks on July 29, 1864.