for Timothy Donovan's Story
Before starting the book:
Print out and read Explanatory Notes for Teachers Using Timothy Donovan's Story for background material that will help answer students' questions.
Discuss words with multiple meanings. Have the students look up the following words in the dictionary and chose the meaning(s) that would be most likely in a book set during the Civil War: quarters, company, battery, salute, magazine, and steamer.
Have students read the blurb on the back cover and make sure they understand 1) that "fire-eaters" were extremist pro-slavery politicians who wanted the south to secede and 2) that "bugle calls" like reveille and the mess call that announced meals organized the soldiers' day.
Using the map opposite page 1, point out that unlike the island where Castle Pinckney is located, many of the islands in the South Carolina low country are separated from the mainland only by narrow waterways, as is Sullivan's Island. Have students estimate the distance between Fort Moultrie and Charleston; between Fort Moultrie and Fort Sumter; between Fort Sumter and Castle Pinckney. ("Castle" is an old-fashioned word for fortress.)
Show the two pictures of Fort Mountie from Timothy Donovan's World.
After Chapter Two:
Show the rest of the pictures from Timothy Donovan's World.
Possible activities as the students read:
1) From www.fmaalumni.org/bugle_calls.html record the calls Timothy sounded. (Tell students that the call "Taps" hadn't yet come into use.)
2) Make a simple display showing the following flags in use at this time:
a) The 34-star U.S. flag that flew over Forts Moultrie and Sumter
b) South Carolina's palmetto tree state flag
c) The seven-star national flag of the Confederacy (Note: This is NOT the controversial battle flag.)
3) Find photographs of Major Robert Anderson and Captain Doubleday, Union officers who were in command at Forts Moultrie and Sumter, and of General Pierre Beauregard, who commanded the Confederate artillerists. Write brief but informative captions for the photos.
4) Draw a scene from each chapter. Write a caption that describes what is happening.
After finishing the book:
Class Activity:
Meeting in small groups, students will brainstorm a list of adjectives to describe each of the following characters: Timothy, Norris, Evans, Major Anderson, O'Brian (the drummer), Captain Doubleday, Corporal Rice. Then members of each group will decide which three adjectives on their list are the most descriptive and can be supported with incidents from the story. (This activity could be continued in a whole-class session in which the group lists are combined and discussed.)
Suggested Discussion Questions:
What incidents in the story show the importance of the flag as a national symbol? How do you think this compares with attitudes toward the flag today?
In what ways was the beginning of the Civil war like the beginnings of 20th century wars? In what ways was it different? (Students would need to prepare for this discussion by finding out how the 20th century wars began.)
How might you paraphrase Anderson's instructions to his artillerists: "Indiscretion is not valor."
Why were two officers allowed to endanger themselves by going onto the barbette to replace the flag on a makeshift pole after it had been shot down even though soldiers weren't allowed to fire the barbette guns because of the danger?
Suggested Writing Exercises:
1) Write a character sketch on one of the following fictional characters: Timothy, Norris, Pvt. Hanson, Pvt. Evans, Mrs. Reilly, or Cpl. Rice. (For this assignment, students might find Page 2 of www.stemnet.nf.ca/CITE/twisters_character_sketch_help.pdf useful.)
2) Write an essay discussing what might have happened if Major Anderson had not moved the garrison to Fort Sumter or if he had surrendered the fort before the bombardment as demanded by Beauregard.
3) Choose one:
a) Write four or five journal entries from the point of view of either Mrs. Reilly (the cook's wife), Corporal Rice, or a character you imagine - the son or daughter of an officer at the fort.
b) Write a letter from Norris to his grandfather.
c) Write a memoir that Timothy might have written as an old man, looking back on the boy he had been.
Explanatory notes for teachers using Timothy Donovan's Story
by Carolyn Reeder
CHAPTER ONE
"Don't tell me you never noticed the local militia units drilling at the far end of the island-and other places around the harbor, too. They've been at it since before last month's election." South Carolina's leaders had been threatening to leave the Union for years, and they began making military preparations in July 1860 when it seemed obvious that no candidate favored by the South would win the presidency. The "hot heads" made it clear that if Lincoln became president, they would secede from the Union, and when he was elected without winning a single electoral vote in the South, they called a secession convention. (Because of an epidemic in the state capital, the convention was moved to Charleston.)
There were more hired laborers working to repair the run-down fort than there were soldiers to safeguard it! Fort Moultrie had held off the British during the American Revolution, but since the War of 1812 there had been little threat of foreign attack, so Moultrie -- and the other harbor forts -- had been allowed to fall into disrepair. The U.S. Army was not a large one during peacetime, and most of its men were stationed in western forts to protect settlers and the pioneers along the emigrant trails, leaving the eastern forts with small garrisons. It wasn't until the summer of 1860 that efforts began to make the forts in Charleston Harbor more effective.
Parade Ground - the open area enclosed by the fort's walls. (In some cases, simply the open area where the army assembled and drilled.)
Drill Call - One of the many "calls" sounded by buglers, drummers, and fifers (either alone or in combination) to signal activities on the daily schedule in a camp or fort. For the artillery, there were 39 calls, including some which were used to direct the men during battles. (At this time, most of the daily calls for the artillery and the infantry had the same names but different "tunes." It wasn't until 1867 that bugle calls were standardized for all branches of the military.)
...turned over to army recruiters - In the mid-nineteenth century, orphaned boys were often taken into the army and trained as field musicians (drummers, buglers, or fifers) as a way of providing care for them.
Ever since Major Anderson took command . . . Major Robert Anderson was ordered to replace the elderly commander at Moultrie and to be in charge of improving the military readiness of the men and the forts in Charleston Harbor, which included the unfinished Fort Sumter, the abandoned Fort John, and Castle Pinckney, which was under repair. The War Department thought that since Major Anderson was a southerner, it wouldn't upset the local people to send him to the Charleston area. (Some believe that the Secretary of War, who was a southerner, sent Anderson to Fort Moultrie with the hope that his southern sentiments would influence him to turn the fort over to the rebels.)
Guard Mount - Each day, men were selected for guard duty. They were divided into three groups and served as sentinels for rotating two-hour periods for the next 24 hours. Each group was under a corporal (the corporal of the guard) and they were all under the command of a sergeant (the sergeant of the guard). Guard Mount, or the "changing of the guard," was often a formal ceremony at which the band played. Like other events of the soldiers' day, it was announced by a field musician sounding a call.
The war with Mexico - The Mexican War (1846-48) began after the U.S. annexed Texas (which was part of Mexico) and American troops occupied an area along the Rio Grande. The treaty that ended the war gave the U.S. two-fifths of Mexico's territory-including the present states of California, Nevada, Utah, parts of New Mexico, Colorado, and Wyoming, and most of Arizona. This set the stage for the American Civil War, because it raised the question of whether slavery would be allowed in states formed from the newly acquired territories in the southwest. It was this issue, rather than the existence of slavery in the original southern states, that led to the secession crisis.
CHAPTER FOUR
March 4 inauguration - Today, presidents are inaugurated on January 20, but the Constitution originally had fixed the date as March 4 in order to allow time for the new president to receive word that he had been elected and to travel to the capital city. Because of improvements in communication and transportation, the Constitution was amended in 1933 and the January date was set so that there would be less time between the president's election in November and his taking office.
CHAPTER EIGHT
"Beauregard was my student at West Point" - Major Anderson's statement is one example of the fact that military men on both sides knew each other well and often had been friends or comrades-in-arms. Because so many of the generals had fought together in the Mexican War, they knew each others' strengths and weaknesses and were often able to predict each others' reactions or decisions on the battlefield.
". . . Sumter and that fort off the Florida coast are the only United States property I know of that these 'Confederates' haven't helped themselves to." One by one, the arsenals, forts, and other U.S. government property in the seceded states had been turned over to the rebels without a fight. Only Fort Sumter and Florida's Fort Pickens (which guarded the harbor at Pensacola Bay on the Gulf of Mexico) remained in Union hands. But Fort Pickens didn't create the same public interest that Sumter did-partly because of its more remote location, partly because the newspapers and political orators had focused everyone's attention on Major Anderson's "bold and patriotic deed" and the fate of his cold, hungry garrison surrounded by rebel batteries. (Fort Monroe, in Hampton Roads, Virginia, was held by the Union throughout the Civil War, but at this time Virginia was still part of the Union.)
CHAPTER NINE
Moments later, he heard the unmistakable whistle of an approaching shell. Terrified, he ran for the safety of the closest gun room, but instead of the expected crash of metal into solid brick, he heard a splash. Some sources say that the shell actually hit the wharf. This is just one example of how first-hand accounts of an event can differ.
CHAPTER TEN
". . . thirty guns and eighteen mortars aimed at Sumter." - Guns refers to what we commonly refer to as cannon. Cannon fire has a long, low path, or trajectory. Mortars are similar to cannon that have a high but shorter trajectory. They are used to fire over the walls of forts and onto the tops of bluffs.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
"I heard a rumor about some kind of a mix-up in the fleet's orders." The rumor was correct. A large warship and the ship bringing the smaller boats that would have been used to transport men and goods to Sumter under the cover of darkness received orders to take provisions and reinforcements to Fort Pickens, in Florida. These orders appeared to replace the earlier ones to proceed to Sumter, so the ships continued on to Pickens.
To link to the author interview, click here.
Return to Teaching Materials page
To stay up to date on the latest information about books and other media of interest to children and young adults, consider subscribing to The Children's Literature Comprehensive Database. For your free trial, click here.
If you’re interested in reviewing children's and young adult books, then send a resume and writing sample to marilyn@childrenslit.com.