There's History Around Every Bend Book Series

There’s History Around Every Bend Books Series is a non-fiction series offering stories that will intrigue. The books are available in retail bookstores throughout the country as well as Barnes & Noble and Amazon. If you are a retailer, interested in these books, they are distributed through Ingram. For further information on this series, please contact us through the contact link.

Rebel Correspondent and Captured Freedom book covers

Captured Freedom

Captured Freedom is the epic true story of nine Union prisoners-of-war who escaped from a Confederate Prison known as Camp Sorghum in Columbia, South Carolina in November 1864. They scrambled north on foot in rags that had once been uniforms of blue. Traveling in brutal winter conditions more than 300 miles with search parties and bloodhounds hot on their trail. On the difficult journey they relied on the help of enslaved men and women, as well as Southerners who sympathized with the North, before finally reaching Union lines on New Years Day 1865.

After arriving in Knoxville, Tennessee, and checking in with Union authorities, one of the men had a wonderful idea. The nine officers and their three mountain guides found a local photographer, hoping to commemorate what they had accomplished by posing together for a photograph. The instant, frozen in time, showed twelve ragged men with determination strong on their faces. It was a Civil War selfie. A moment that Captured Freedom.

Author Steve Procko, an Emmy-award winning documentarian, received a copy of the more than 150-year-old photograph from a descendant of one of the mountain guides. Upon identifying and researching the men in the photograph, he realized their remarkable story had never been told.

They say every picture tells a story. This one tells many.

Click here to visit the Captured Freedom website

(ISBN: 979-8-9880244-0-8)


Rebel Correspondent

Rebel Correspondent by Steve Procko is the true story of Arba F. Shaw, a private in Company F, 4th Georgia Cavalry (Avery). Shaw wrote over 40,000 words thirty-five years after the war which was published in his local newspaper, then lost to time. Over a century later Steve Procko stumbled upon the collection of Shaw’s newspaper articles. Rebel Correspondent is part biography, part a history of the individual men of Arba’s unit, and always fascinating.

Rebel Correspondent was awarded a Distinguished Favorita at the 2023 Independent Press Awards. Click here for an Independent Press Awards interview with author Steve Procko

Click here to visit the Rebel Correspondent website

(ISBN 978-1-7372834-0-9)