TMI

Sometimes, less is a lot better than a lot. TMI. Too Much Information. 

Historians love TMI. It lets them cherry-pick just the best pieces of historical fruit to include in their books. Writers of historical fiction sometimes hate TMI, because having too many known facts sets us on a restricted plot line.

Sometimes discovery of one sentence telling of a scantily recorded bit of history is grist for a better chapter than is the diligent study of a whole book of detailed facts about a more important happening.

For instance: On May 6, 1864, Longstreet’s corps, led by the Texas Brigade, arrived at the Battle of the Wilderness just in time to literally save the day for General Lee’s Confederate army. The Texas Brigade was “first in.” It was such an important day in the Civil War and the role of the Texans was so vital to the outcome, that every book about the battle includes a full description of the Texas Brigade’s last-minute arrival, rapid deployment, and heavy casualties. Over the last 150 years, I bet more than a hundred writers have written tens of thousands of words about the Texas Brigade’s performance on May 6, 1864.

That meant when I described the Wilderness Battle in Defiant Honor, I had to keep my narrative tightly in accord with the well-established facts. I admit it is fun to dig around in several books, and primary source accounts that are easily found online. It’s fun to pare down TMI until I’m left with a set of details that fit my characters’ actions and my novelist’s need to tell an exciting story. But, TMI makes writing historical fiction more akin to detective work than freewheeling writing.

But not always. Jump ahead just one month to June 17^th, to the next time the Texas Brigade charged the enemy. I’ve found just one modern historian who has written about it. In 1970, in Hood’s Texas Brigade: Lee’s Grenadier Guard, Harold Simpson wrote, “Annoyed by the constant sharpshooting, skirmishing, and shelling to their front…the Texas Brigade spontaneously charged from their earthworks with one of the grandest yells heard in a long time.”

Now that’s a description that this writer of historical fiction can run with. It’s not an event that a dozen eyewitnesses recorded for newspapers back home, nor one that old veterans wrote about in their foggy memories decades after the war ended. It’s just a bare-bones account that leaves me lots of creative wriggle room. The term spontaneous  provides a rare opportunity for my fictitious characters to jump out front.

Writing fiction is full of spontaneity. Fiction authors just follow their noses and create the plot as they go. History writers are hide-bound to do the opposite. Historians have to stick with the known facts. When they get spontaneous and start speculating, they lose their academic credibility, and their next book doesn’t sell well.

Writers of historical fiction are in a nice middle ground. We have to stay within the known historical facts, but we’re free to toss in fictitious people and fictitious actions by real people, as long as we don’t mess with the known history.

So, today I’m putting Captain McBee’s company into the cauldron again. They’ve been in battle after battle, their numbers have been halved and halved again by disease and battle casualties. The Confederate army is down, but not out.

The remaining men in Company C are lean and mean, accustomed to deprivation and hardship. They are committed to staying the course, but secretly fearful the end is near. They are not dumb, they have eyes, and their bellies are empty more often than not. After three years of soldiering, they have little patience for bullshit or Yankees.

It’s a fine time for High Private Rafe Fulton, Lieutenant Hubbard, and Corporal Jason Smith—all fictitious soldiers—to lead the Texas Brigade’s historical June 17^th spontaneous charge at a little-known place known as Howlett’s Farm. The Yankees better watch out, because my spontaneous juices are flowing.