Research is (obviously) a huge part of writing historical fiction, and luckily for us today, there is so much available through libraries and online that research is—at least I imagine—so much easier today than it was even 20 years ago. A huge shout-out to our librarians and to those working to digitize original documents!
However, it is still amazing to be able to research on-site—in the historical societies or collections where original documents are held and to visit historical sites. Visiting these places is a great excuse to travel (any excuse to travel is a good excuse in my opinion), and they really breathe life into history. If you are someone who thinks history isn’t your thing or is boring or irrelevant to us today, I challenge you to visit a historical site, and especially one that does living history, and still feel the same.
As a historical fiction writer, visiting these places can also reveal unexpected things about the location(s) and history that can add a lot to a novel and bring the world characters inhabit to life.
A few years ago, my parents and I took a trip out to the Lake Champlain area, mostly so I could visit Fort Ticonderoga, but we also did some kayaking near Valcour Island and did some hiking. So often when I am researching, I am focused on the historical facts—who was at each event and why and what they were doing—that I forget to think about how the world around my characters would feel and how they would experience it. One thing that I hadn’t really thought about was the terrain around Lake Champlain. We have so many lakes in Minnesota, so I know what lakes and the land surrounding them are like, right? Not so much. Although academically I knew there were mountains surrounding Lake Champlain, I had failed to take into consideration how that would change the terrain. I was surprised to find the ground shifting from grass and dirt to stone—in our case, slippery stone because of recent rains. This may seem like an odd thing to pay attention to when researching, but in my upcoming second book, Whitley and the army are forced to travel overland to reach Fort Ti. How different that scene would be if I wasn’t aware of how it feels to try to keep my footing, the constant strain of muscles adjusting to the ups and downs of the land.
Realization of this one thing then made me pay attention to other sensory details—what did the air smell like? What would it look like without a clear path? How would this feel, smell, look different in October (when the scene takes place) opposed to July (when we were there)?
During our hiking, we were also set upon by swarms of mosquitoes and flies. I expect mosquitoes at home, but I don’t always think/remember (especially when I am writing) that mosquitoes are not uniquely Minnesotan. The experience of hiking over tricky terrain while being eaten alive by mosquitoes and flies stuck in my brain in a way it wouldn’t have had I only been doing book/online research. These experiences made (or I suppose, will make) their way into Whitley’s experience traveling along Lake Champlain.
Although so much is available online, not just documents but images of items and artifacts, unless you know what to search for, finding the objects that people used in daily life—the ones that you might not think about—is very difficult. So the ability to see a wide range of artifacts in museums and collections is not only eye-opening, but causes me to consider what details to include to really bring my characters to life.
I recently saw these at Fort Ticonderoga:
I was confused as to what they were until I found the label: pipe stems. Of course soldiers would have smoked, but seeing all the pipe stems that were found somehow makes this fact more real than just knowing something academically. The same is true of things like dishes and buttons, sewing needles and socks.
Seeing these artifacts in person can also answer questions that I didn’t know I had: waterskins or canteens? Canteens! Shoes or boots? Shoes! My favorite objects to look at are powder horns. Although it is not a surprise that soldiers carried these, the artwork on the powder horns was something I would not have expected and would not be included in books. I was terribly disappointed to learn (at the Concord Museum this spring) that soldiers usually did not carve their own powder horns, but would turn them over to a professional carver. Soldiers carried cartridge boxes as well—these were mostly replacing the need for powder horns as far as soldiers were concerned, but they still would have carried powder horns with supplies of extra powder.
Even more than seeing objects or getting a sense of place and space, being able to speak to historians, reenactors, and interpreters on-site is invaluable. While a book or an article might cover an event, person, or topic generally, those who work on-site day in and day out know things about daily life that cannot be found elsewhere—or if they can be found somewhere online, you would really have to know how and what to search. I’ve had great conversations with reenactors, interpreters, and historians about the clothes militiamen would have worn, printing and blacksmithing techniques, how the set-up of a house would have changed from winter to summer, cleaning muskets, clothing repair, shoemaking, boat building, . . . I could probably go on for far too long. Reenactors and on-site interpreters do tons of research into daily life, into the people they are portraying, and/or the location they are based in that conversations with them reveal information I never would have thought to look up or—sometimes—even ask them about.
I know I mentioned burial grounds in my blog about the 250th of Lexington and Concord, but they are always a stop for me when I am on-site. One of the best things I ever did was take a tour of Eastern Cemetery in Portland, ME through Spirits Alive with historian and author Ron Romano. Not only did I learn specifics about that burial ground, but I learned about body storage during winter months, the differences in gravestone carving from one stoneworker to another and from time period to time period, the use of slate for stones specifically during the colonial and Revolutionary periods. These are now things that I look for in every burial ground I visit.
So, go! Experience the history for yourself and see what surprising things you learn!