Witching Times

John William De Forest was a writer. His major novel, Miss Ravenel's Conversion from Secession to Loyalty (1867), and two works, A Volunteer's Adventures (published posthumously in 1946) and A Union Officer in the Reconstruction (published posthumously in 1948), which originally appeared in the Atlantic Monthly and Putnam's magazines, show detailed pictures of the society and manners of the South during and after the Civil War. De Forest was born in Seymour, Connecticut, and his first published work was the History of the Indians of Connecticut from the Earliest Known Period to 1850 (1851). He lived with his brother in Syria for several years and traveled widely through the Near East and Europe. He married and settled in the South but served with the Connecticut Volunteers in the Civil War.