Fort Sumter

 was a key location in the American Civil War. Massachusetts schoolteacher Claire Bartlett expressed shock to Union officer Will Johnson in a 16 April 1861 letter, wondering, "Can the Confederacy really have opened fire on American troops at Fort Sumter?" (PROSE: Blood and Hope)

Behind the scenes
John Ostrander's foreword to the novella tells us: "South Carolina ... in firing on the Northern troops in Fort Sumter, started the armed conflict."