Across Five Aprils Character Analysis

Jethro Creighton

Jethro Creighton is the youngest of Matt and Ellen’s children. He grows up on his family’s farm surrounded by his siblings John, Bill, Tom, Mary, and Jenny and his cousin… read analysis of Jethro Creighton

Shadrach Yale

Shadrach Yale (“Shad”) teaches at the school where Matt and Ellen Creighton send their children. A transplant from Pennsylvania to southern Illinois, Shad is an intelligent, accomplished man and a generous, kind teacher. He becomes… read analysis of Shadrach Yale

Jenny Creighton

Jenny Creighton, daughter of Ellen and Matt, is the closest sibling in age to Jethro—she and Jethro are the youngest of the Creighton siblings. Their closeness in age and mutual admiration for Shadrach… read analysis of Jenny Creighton

Ross Milton

Ross Milton edits the Jasper County newspaper, and he is a friend to the Creighton family. Ross suffers from debilitating arthritis, and his ability to continue with his life nevertheless—even chaperoning Jenny Creighton on a… read analysis of Ross Milton

Bill Creighton

Bill Creighton is the son of Matt and Ellen Creighton and the brother to John, Tom, Mary (deceased), Jenny, and Jethro. He is Jethro’s favorite among his brothers, and he has… read analysis of Bill Creighton

Matthew Creighton

Matthew Creighton is the patriarch of the Creighton family, husband of Ellen and father to John, Bill, Tom, Mary (deceased), Jenny, and Jethro, along with other children dead or living… read analysis of Matthew Creighton

Eb Carron

Eb Carron is Matthew Creighton’s nephew, although he grows up alongside the rest of the Creighton children—John, Bill, Tom, Mary, Jenny, and Jethro—after his parents die when… read analysis of Eb Carron

Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln is the 16th president of the United States. His election in 1861 deals a serious blow to the Democratic Party (at the time, the Democratic Party was primarily aligned with white, slaveholding landowners… read analysis of Abraham Lincoln

Ellen Creighton

Ellen Creighton is the wife of Matt Creighton and matriarch of the Creighton family. Ellen has a dependence on coffee, even though her strong Protestant Christian faith makes her resent and try to resist… read analysis of Ellen Creighton

John Creighton

John Creighton is the eldest son of Matt and Ellen Creighton still living at the family farm in southern Illinois. His younger siblings are Bill (with whom he is best friends), Tom, Mary (deceased)… read analysis of John Creighton

Ulysses S. Grant

Ulysses S. Grant is a historical general who served in the Union Army during the American Civil war and was subsequently elected president. Grant’s military career features a mix of daring victories and disastrous defeats… read analysis of Ulysses S. Grant

Robert E. Lee

Robert E. Lee is a historical Confederate general from the American Civil War who rises to become leader of the entire Confederate Army and who signs the South’s surrender to Ulysses S. Grant at the… read analysis of Robert E. Lee

George B. McClellan

George B. McClellan is a historical general in the Union Army whose swift rise to prominence and important early victories give heart to the North that its cause is just and that the war will… read analysis of George B. McClellan

Tom Creighton

Tom Creighton is one of Matt and Ellen Creighton’s children. He is the same age as (and best friends with) his cousin, Eb Carron. At the beginning of the war, Tom is eager… read analysis of Tom Creighton

Ed Turner

Ed Turner is the Creighton family’s neighbor. Like Matt and Ellen, he is a subsistence farmer who supports himself and his family with the produce he raises on his own land. After John… read analysis of Ed Turner

Mary Creighton

Mary Creighton is the daughter of Matt and Ellen Creighton and the sister of John, Bill, Tom, Jenny, and Jethro. When Jethro is seven years old, Mary attends a dance… read analysis of Mary Creighton

Travis Burdow

Travis Burdow is a young man from a family whom local opinion holds to all be petty criminals. His thoughtless action of harassment causes Mary Creighton’s accidental death, but Matt Creighton spares Travis’s life… read analysis of Travis Burdow

Dave Burdow

Dave Burdow is the father of Travis Burdow and the son of a somewhat-infamous man whom local lore holds to be a thief. As a result, the local community shuns and maligns the Burdows, especially… read analysis of Dave Burdow

Nancy Creighton

Nancy Creighton is John Creighton’s wife. The couple has two sons. Born in Kansas and evidently raised in a harsh family, Nancy is shy and withdrawn. Over the course of the war, however, she… read analysis of Nancy Creighton

Guy Wortman

Guy Wortman is the Creighton family’s neighbor. He’s a bully who often drinks too much. He has harsh words for the Creighton family after learning that Bill Creighton has enlisted in the Confederate Army, and… read analysis of Guy Wortman

Sam Gardiner

Sam Gardiner owns the general store in Newton, Illinois. He stands up for the Creightons after Guy Wortman and his friends begin to terrorize the family. Then, when Wortman turns his sights on the general… read analysis of Sam Gardiner

Minor Characters

Hig Phillips

Hig Phillips is a Jasper County landowner who pays another man $300 to enlist in his name to avoid serving in the Union Army after it establishes a draft. Some Union Army defectors, all too aware of the sacrifices they made for men like Hig, murder him.

Dan Lawrence

Dan Lawrence is the son of one of the Creightons’ neighbors who serves alongside Tom Creighton and Eb Carron in the Union Army. Lawrence brings the family news of Tom’s death at the Battle of Shiloh.

Wilse Graham

Wilse Graham is Ellen Creighton’s nephew. He, along with most of her kin, still live in Kentucky. When he visits his aunt in southern Illinois, he gives voice to the reasons for Southern secession.

Aunt Victoria

A relative of Shadrach Yale, Aunt Victoria sends a letter to Matt Creighton to let the family know that Shad has been grievously wounded in the Battle of Gettysburg. She hosts Jenny Creighton at her home in Washington, D.C., while Shad convalesces there.