November 2025 Book Review: Bessie in Love and War

Book by: Karen Stokes
Review by: Dr. Wendy Hooper-Meletes, Ed.D., owner of Litchfield Books

Writing under a fictitious name of Patience Pennington, Elizabeth Allston Pringle (1845–1921), author of A Woman Rice Planter and Chronicles of Chicora Wood, penned diary entries of her efforts to manage two South Carolina rice plantations post-Civil War. Plantation life, despite falling rice prices and labor issues, afforded Pringle to make her father’s rice plantations profitable. Her stories became well known due to their elevated literary quality and became a bestselling legacy.

But what about Elizabeth Allston Pringle’s love life? Although Elizabeth did not publish books about her love life, leaving her love story incomplete, author Karen Stokes tells that part of her story and more in her new book, Bessie in Love and War. In quiet reverence and gloved hands South Carolina Historical Society archivist Karen Stokes may have examined brittle envelopes, bound journals, unpublished diaries and letters tied with a fragile string. Straining to make out the elegant cursive handwriting and faded ink, archivist Karen must have read between the lines. Finding an emotional toll, Karen rewrites Elizabeth’s passionate love story to John Pringle. Although Elizabeth had a rebellious, selfish, and temperamental nature, Karen notes she would eventually overcome them due to her aristocratic Christian upbringing and find herself the main object of his attention.When he shook hands with me and said good-by, the look in his eye was a revelation and declaration of devotion that seemed to compass me and seal me as forever his, near or far, with my own will or without it. From that moment I knew that no other man could be anything to me (Karen Stokes et al., 2025).

John Julius Pringle left Elizabeth awestruck. Her feelings for John Julius Pringle became so strong that they frightened her, finally accepting his proposal of marriage at the age of 25. Her unpublished letters and diaries, touchingly reveal her stormy path and how God had used all her trials to mold her into a much-loved woman of exceptional ability, talent, and wisdom.Karen’s book includes never before published photographs of Elizabeth as a young woman and her husband John Julius Pringle.

Come meet Karen Stokes at our Litchfield Books Exclusive Author Luncheon on Friday, November 21, 2025, from 11-1 pm at Café Piccolo in Pawleys Island, SC.

For tickets: www.litchfieldbooks.com/events

Karen Stokes, & posts, V. all. (2025, June 15). A woman rice planter’s story of love and faith. Abbeville Institute. www.abbevilleinstitute.org/a-woman-rice-planters-story-of-love-and-faith/