May 6, 2025
Civil War Letters Bring Romance to Goshen Stage
Now the Magic Begins
By Jack Sheedy
Photographs by Ryan Lavine
Goshen resident Kathleen Kelly learned in 2023 about a trove of Civil War love letters. Her theatrical instinct told her the story cried out for the stage.
“Civil War love letters. You can say that in a nail salon, and heads will turn,” she says.
Kelly is an actor, producer, and director. She inquired at the Goshen Library about a book based on the letters. Cinzi Lavin, a noted Litchfield County novelist, musician, and playwright, overheard her.
Lavin recalls that she said, “I can probably help you with that.”
Lavin had read the late Ernest B. Barker’s 2002 book Fred and Jennie: A Civil War Love Story, which tells of the letters that led to a 35-year marriage between Sergeant Major Frederick Lucas and Sarah Jane “Jennie” Wadhams, both of Goshen.
Lavin and Kelly teamed up, and in 2024, Lavin wrote A Goodnight Kiss, a two-act play slated to be mounted by the Goshen Players in June. Kelly will produce and direct.
“There are two narrators, one white and one black,” Kelly says. “They’ll be working the audience throughout.”
Characters also include Fred, Jennie, and two gossiping women who help establish the mood of Goshen in the 1860s. Jennie’s father, John Marsh Wadhams—who first opposed the marriage—also makes an appearance, as does Fred’s war buddy, Thomas Huxley.
The future lovers met in 1862, when Fred was being mustered into the Union Army at Litchfield Green. Jennie gave him a pocket-sized Bible.
“I’m sure he thought, ‘This was an angel, giving me this,’” Kelly says.
Barker was descended from both the Wadhams and Lucas families. When the Wadhams homestead was sold in 1974, letters from Fred to Jennie were found and entrusted to him.
Four years later, Barker moved with his family to a former Lucas family homestead in Goshen. There, in a shoebox, were the letters from Jennie to Fred. Barker’s book contains both sides of the correspondence.
The letters now reside at the Connecticut Museum of Culture and History in Hartford.
In the correspondence, Fred describes the horror of battle, including carnage at Cold Harbor, Va., in 1864: “I have seen men fall by my side, shot & dead at once.… This is war without romance. It is the reality of the picture.”
Far from the battlefields, Jennie writes to Fred about more innocent activities: gathering flowers in the woods, and having her photograph taken.
They married in 1867. Fred became a respected Goshen merchant and Connecticut General Assemblyman. Weakened by war wounds, he died in 1902. Jennie taught school in New Britain and died in 1909.
Anticipating opening night, Kelly says, “Now the magic begins.”
Lavin predicts, “This will be the historic event of the year.”
A Goodnight Kiss: Goshen’s Civil War Love Story will be presented at Goshen Old Town Hall, 2 North St., June 6 and 7 at 8 p.m., with a 3 p.m. matinee followed by a panel discussion June 8. For ticket information, call 860-491-9988.
