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As a precious and expensive commodity, coffee represents luxury to the subsistence-farming Creighton family. When the war causes the price of coffee to spike, it shows how the Civil War affected nearly everyone in the United States personally, not just the soldiers fighting for the Union or Confederate Armies. Coffee also serves as an index of maturity; at nine years old, Jethro Creighton begins to participate in the adult tasks of planting and harvesting, and because of this, he is granted a share of coffee alongside the book’s adult characters.
Coffee Quotes in Across Five Aprils
The Across Five Aprils quotes below all refer to the symbol of Coffee. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 5
Quotes
Ellen lay in her bed, limp with the agony of a headache. It always happened when the supply of coffee ran out. Given a cup of strong, hot coffee, the pain would leave her almost immediately; lacking it, her suffering mounted by the hour until the pain became almost unbearable. Schooled to believe that self-indulgence of any kind was morally unacceptable, Ellen was deeply ashamed of her dependency on coffee. She tried brewing drinks of roasted grain or roots, but her nervous system was not deceived by a beverage that resembled coffee only in appearance. She tried stretching out her supply by making a very weak drink, but she might as well have drunk nothing; the headaches were prevented only by coffee that was black with strength.
In late March of 1862, coffee had reached the unheard price of seventy cents a pound, and the papers predicted it would rise even higher.
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Coffee Symbol Timeline in Across Five Aprils
The timeline below shows where the symbol Coffee appears in Across Five Aprils. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 1
...planting, he gets to eat at the first sitting and drink a mug of hot coffee. His teenaged brother Tom and cousin Eb—who’s lived with the Creightons since his own parents...
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Jenny and Nancy pour coffee and load the table with roasted meat, potatoes, and cornbread. John compliments Jenny on the...
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Chapter 5
...the spring of 1862, the war has begun to affect the prices of goods like coffee. Ellen suffers terrible headaches without it, but she’s also appalled at the rising prices and...
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...to leave them alone with a lit lamp. She hands Jethro her whole bag of coffee. Then she asks if he and Jenny would come play with their nephews sometime to...
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A cup of fresh black coffee quickly revives Ellen. After consulting with her, Matt calls Jethro and asks the boy if...
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...Matt and Jethro load the wagon with sacks of corn. Ellen shares her cup of coffee—diluted with hot milk—with her son, and Jenny makes him a special breakfast. Jethro feels proud...
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Chapter 6
...nor Ellen sleeps well. In the morning, Matt looks pale and drawn. Over cups of coffee, he tells Ellen his plan to ride into town with Ed Turner to talk to...
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Chapter 9
...as a kettle and a few lumps of sugar to brew him hot sassafras tea—Ellen’s coffee is too precious to risk his taking any. Eb looks a little better after a...
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