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Richmond, Va., January 30th, 1906.

Only within the last two years have I had the opportunity to cultivate an intimate personal acquaintance with Rev. J. L. Underwood, but as the greater part of our lives have been spent in the States of Georgia and Alabama, I have been quite familiar with his career through a period which embraces a half century. Wherever he is known he is highly esteemed for his intellectual gifts and culture, his fluency and eloquence in speech, his genial manner, his high moral and Christian ideals, and his unflinching fealty to what he believes to be his country’s welfare. No man who followed the Confederate flag had a clearer understanding or a more profound appreciation of what he was fighting for. No man watched and studied more carefully the progress of the contest. No man interpreted more accurately the spirit, purposes, and conduct of the contending armies. When the struggle closed no man foresaw with more distinctness what was in the womb of the future for the defeated South. His cultivated intellect, his high moral and Christian character, his personal observations and experiences, his residence and travels in Europe, his extensive acquaintance and correspondence with public men, North and South, and his present devotion to the interests of our united country, render him pre-eminently qualified for the task of delineating some features of the greatest war of modern times.

I have been permitted to read the manuscript of Mr. Underwood’s book, entitled, “The Women of the Confederacy.” I do not hesitate to pronounce it a valuable and enduring contribution to our country’s history. There is not a page in it that is dull or commonplace. No man who starts to read it will lay it aside until he has reached the conclusion of it. The author’s definitions of the relations of each sovereign State to the Federal Union and of her rights under the Federal Constitution are exact. His argument in support of the Constitutional right of secession amounts to a demonstration. His interpretation of the long series of political events which drove the South into secession is clear, just and convincing. His tributes to the patriotism and valor of the Southern women are brilliant and thrilling without the semblance of extravagance. His description of the vandalism of Sherman’s army in its march through Georgia and South Carolina cannot fail to kindle a flame of indignation in the heart of any civilized man who reads it. His anecdotes, both humorous and pathetic, are well chosen.

The section of this book which relates most directly to “The Women of the Confederacy,” including Mr. Underwood’s tribute in the Symposium to their memory, is by far the most thrilling and meritorious part of it. Into this the author has put his best material, his deepest emotions, his finest sentiments, and his most eloquent words. To the conduct of Southern women in that unprecedented ordeal, history furnishes no parallel. Through many generations to come it will be the favorite theme of the poets and orators.

I need no prophetic gift to see that this book will be immensely popular and extensively circulated. Its aged and afflicted author has done a work in writing it which deserves the gratitude and applause of his fellow countrymen.

J. B. Hawthorne.