When He Was Gone

<p>Elizabeth Garraux deeply loved her husband Frederick and he was willing to turn their lives upside down to please her. And yet within years of a perilous Atlantic crossing she ended up on her own in a new country with eleven children. </p><p><br></p><p>So how during the tumultuous post-Civil War years in the deep South was Elizabeth able to become a great success? It was a time of social upheaval racial tension and systemic misogyny with women often treated as nothing more than their husband's property.</p><p><br></p><p>This novel is woven around the Garrauxs' true-life story -- one of triumphs and of tragedies so disturbing they were reported in newspapers across the country.</p><p>Elizabeth five feet tall and 100 pounds was truly indomitable. She shattered expectations and conquered adversity to create a new life in Greenville South Carolina despite her husband's mysterious absence.</p><p><br></p><p>Several years ago I discovered that we currently live on the land that was once her home. And Elizabeth's unrelating insistent whispers from the past required that her story be told.</p>