The Pillar of Fire (J. H. Ingraham)

The Pillar of Fire

An exciting drama based on the Old Testament story of Israel in Egypt

A highly colorful, suspenseful story of the visit of the Prince of Tyre to Egypt, with a regal eloquence unlike any other Lamplighter book. It’s an exciting drama that sheds light on portions of the Old Testament from events 3,500 years ago.

The story is an effort to portray a Biblical account, through historical fiction, in which Moses and the Israelite exodus from Egyptian bondage is told through a series of letters, written primarily by Sesostris, Prince of Tyre, to his mother, Queen Epiphia of Phoenicia, while visiting in Egypt.  Some 40 years later, Remeses continues the writing to his son to Sesostris while he too is visiting in Egypt after his father has risen to the throne.

Other than the fictional Prince of Tyre and the obvious “poetic license” needed to fill in the details, the plot is amazingly true to the Biblical account.

About the Author

J. H. Ingraham (1809 – 1860) was an American author and minister. Born at Portland, Maine, Ingraham spent several years at sea on one of his grandfather’s vessels.  He later worked as a teacher of languages in Mississippi, where he began writing. In 1835 he published his first book, The Southwest by a Yankee.  The next year Lafitte, the Pirate of the Gulf was issued. Burton; or, The Sieges, a novel of Aaron Burr and Revolutionary Days, appeared in 1838.  Novel followed novel in rapid succession so that by 1846 he had written 80 of them!

At Natchez, he married Mary Brooks.  She was a cousin of Phillips Brooks, who wrote the hymn O Little Town of Bethlehem.  The couple had three daughters and a son. In the 1840s Ingraham published some writings in Arthur’s Magazine and then he became an Episcopal minister in 1852.

Popular Magazine Writer

Under the pen-name of F. Clinton Barrington he wrote stories for popular publications like Gleason’s Pictorial Drawing-Room Companion. At age 51, he died in 1860, at Holly Springs, MS, from an accidental gunshot wound.

The Pillar of Fire, published just a year before Ingraham’s unfortunate and untimely death, was the third most popular book read in America during the times of The War Between the States.  It is an eloquently-written, illustrative account of the Prince of Tyre during his visit to Egypt more than 3500 years ago. The author brings colorful inspiration to every page in this suspense-filled drama, including flashbacks which explain how Moses came to be raised as the son of Pharaoh’s daughter.

The Pillar of Fire is said to be one of the books that Cecil B. DeMille used as the basis for the plot of his epic film The Ten Commandments starring Charlton Heston as Moses.  It is the first in the author’s Biblical trilogy, followed by The Throne of David and The Prince of the House of David.

Contents

1. Author’s Chapter to the Reader
2. Letters of Sesostrist to Queen Epiphia (25 letters)
3. Letters Between Remeses and other Persons Covering a Period of Five Years (7 letters)
4. More Letters of Remeses of Damascus to His Father, King Sesostris (12 letters)

Appendix