Army Letters from an Officer's Wife, 1871-1888, a book by Frances Marie Antoinette Mack Roe was originally printed in 1909. This is a collection of letters written by a woman in the 1870s who proceeded to 'The Far West' (Colorado Territory). The stories included in the letters gave a good knowledge of how people lived in the west at the time as well and what military life was like. Frances Roe notes the problems of camp and garrison life with servants, sand, and shortages, and the enjoyments of parties and new friends, of hunting, fishing, and camping trips, and of long play with her dog Hal. She is courageous and brilliant, but she's also just a woman in the middle of out there try to stay alive and make a nice home for herself, her husband, and her new dog. Some interesting illustrations of army life in the west and her experiences with various Indian tribes and her pleasure of army post living when she correlated it to living in the eastern cities also.
Frances Marie Antoinette Mack Roe is a renowned author. Frances M.A.Roe born Frances Marie Antoinette Mack (22 August 1846-6 May 1920) was the daughter of Ralph Gilbert Make and Mary Colton Mack of Watertown, New York. On August 1871 she married US Army Officer Fayette Washington Roe, Lieutenant Colonel in the United States Army, who was sent to Fort Lyon in Colorado Territory. While her husband's career has been reported as common, she accompanied him and recorded as her life during these years in a diary. Roe resumes to be known on the basis of her book for the correct picture of Army life it portrayed. Black soldiers from this time known as the Buffalo Soldiers. Roe said about the Buffalo Soldiers: These Buffalo Soldiers are energetic, intelligent and determined men; are superbly prepared to fight the Indians, whenever they may be called upon to do so, and seem to me to be rather superior to the common of white men employed in time of peace. Roe expired in Port Orange, Florida, and was buried with her husband in Arlington National Cemetery. Some of her books are an attraction for readers. A collection of her letters where she narrated her experiences, was published as a book, Army Letters from an Officer's Wife, in 1909.
