Conspiracy of Knaves by Dee Brown

First published: 1986

Type of work: Historical fiction

Themes: War, politics and law, and gender roles

Time of work: 1864

Recommended Ages: 15-18

Locale: Various places in the Midwestern and Southern areas of the United States and Windsor, Ontario, Canada

Principal Characters:

• Jennie Gray, also known as
• Belle Rutledge, a stage actress who uses her theatrical skills to gather political and military intelligence
• Major Charles Heywood, a Confederate officer charged with freeing Southern prisoners of war from a Northern prison camp
• Johnny Truscott, a twenty-year-old Confederate cavalry officer imprisoned in Camp Douglas, near Chicago
• Dr. Julian Aylott, a Chicago manufacturer of patent medicines involved with the Copperheads (Northerns sympathetic to the Confederacy)
• Colonel Lucius Eberhart, an aging British soldier of fortune recruited by Heywood
• Marianna Heywood, Charles’s cousin, a flighty beauty who cannot requite Truscott’s passionate love
• Kendrich, a Union spy who infiltrates Heywood’s plot
• Colonel Wright, Union commander at Camp Douglas
• Otis Jordan, a Confederate cavalryman in Camp Douglas who spies for the commandant

The Story

Conspiracy of Knaves is narrated by Belle Rutledge, who wants readers to know the truth behind the Northwest Conspiracy that was based in Chicago during the third year of the Civil War. Like all narrators, she is anxious that readers see events her way. She was one of many conspirators indicted, convicted, and pardoned. Yet many of the guilty escaped, and Belle wants the whole truth known. As the only person involved with all three sets of plotters, she alone can present the whole fabric of events. Because Belle is an actress by profession and training, the reader should expect to find her tale filled with the staples of drama: disguise, deception, romance, passion, betrayal and hairbreadth escapes.

The structure of the novel traces Belle’s involvement with three parties of conspirators. Each group partakes in the grand Copperhead plot. The Copperheads were Northern Democrats who opposed Lincoln’s conduct of the war and were sympathetic to the cause of the Confederacy.

The first group is the intelligence unit of the Confederate Army, which recruits Belle to aid Charles Heywood in organizing Northerners having Southern sympathies into an army to liberate General Morgan’s famed Rebel cavalry from a Union prison. As Belle and Charles cross into Union territory with tens of thousands of dollars, Belle suspects Heywood of planning a greater coup: a Copperhead-led secession from the Union of Midwestern states.

Through Heywood, Belle meets Copperheads such as Julian Aylott. Usually professional men, they form societies having noble names, such as the Sons of Liberty, and employing intricate rituals. At secret meetings, these men pass along military and political intelligence to Heywood. They claim numerous followers ready to rise in revolt if only the Confederacy would provide guns, horses, and supplies. Although Charles often gives them money, these leaders never fulfill their promises. Plans laboriously made fall through; deadlines for action are set but pass uneventfully. Belle realizes that the Copperheads are self-important people playing at political intrigue. They love the glamour of ritual and the thrill of an adventure of secrecy yet take few risks and profit prettily from Major Heywood’s largess.

Confederate agents and Copperhead plotters face a crafty foe in Union army officers such as Colonel Wright of Camp Douglas. Skillfully, they parry the subversive thrusts of the enemy, yet they talk with great fear of the Copperhead threat. When Belle penetrates the Union command disguised as an officer, she learns how exaggerated and self-serving the fear is. The ruling Republican Party, facing a challenge in the 1864 presidential election from Democratic nominee General George McClellan, finds it valuable to have powerful enemies both open and hidden. The greater the perceived danger, the less likely the public will vote to change the nation’s leader.

Even as Belle moves through these circles of knaves, she meets people for whom the war’s ideals and sacrifices are real. Brave Johnny Truscott endures imprisonment with the hope that he will be liberated to fight again for the South. Obnoxious little Winslow Barber, orphaned by the war, tries to find caretakers who can become a new family. Aging mercenary Colonel Eberhart seeks one more noble adventure, one more heroic battle, lest he die at home of old age. Ordinary people such as Truscott, Barber, and Eberhart feel the war’s effects without the ability to manipulate them. As the novel ends, Belle moves in with Johnny Truscott and adopts Winslow; she opens a dancing and dramatic arts academy for young ladies. She finally discovers domestic tranquillity without the romance or tragedy of war.

Context

Dee Brown is the author of more than twenty-five books about United States history. For many years a librarian, he uses his familiarity with primary sources (diaries, letters, newspapers, government records) to write both fictional and nonfictional accounts of intriguing but little-known episodes in nineteenth century America.

Brown’s primary interest has been the fate of the American Indian. In books such as Yellowhorse (1956) and Pawnee, Blackfoot and Cheyenne (1961), Brown told the stories of brave chieftains and tribes unable to stem the advance of white settlers. His most noted book on Native Americans is Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee (1970), a vivid historical account of the slaughter of Sioux Indians in 1890 by the U.S. Army. A best-seller, it was issued in a children’s version in 1975 and served as the basis for Brown’s fictional version of the event, Creek Mary’s Blood (1980).

Brown also has written frequently about the Civil War, especially about events sensational at the time but seldom mentioned in modern accounts. Grierson’s Raid (1954) describes a raid deep into Confederate territory by inexperienced Union troops under the command of a bookish, novice officer. The Galvanized Yankees (1963) recounts the adventures of Confederate prisoners of war recruited by the Union to fight Indians in the West.

Brown’s historical works are noteworthy for vivid details and the author’s ability, by the use of primary sources, to re-create the personalities of actual participants. His books are balanced accounts that show both the professed ideals and selfish motivations of the people who shaped events. Brown’s novels generally receive critical praise for a lively style and adept plotting; they entice readers who generally avoid nonfictional works into learning about America’s past. On occasion, Brown has been criticized for giving nineteenth century characters twentieth century attitudes and outlooks. Given Brown’s familiarity with primary sources, the chances are that he succeeds more often than he fails in recreating the mood, feelings, and outlook of Americans a century ago.