Irene Garland

Celeska. Irene Garland

Celeska is the story of an infant white girl who is captured by Cherokee Indians in the 18th century. As a young woman, she eventually leaves the tribe and manages to find her birth family. Emma Georgie Irene Garland married LeRoy Ardis Edwards and became my paternal grandmother. In her memory I am reprinting "Celeska," a book she wrote as a young woman, probably in the late 1890's. It was published by Banner in DeKalb, Texas and is now in the public domain. Considering the way Celeska is written, and that Celeska was around seventeen years old, I think my grandmother was probably around seventeen years old when she wrote Celeska. I am presenting Celeska just as it was published. Any spelling or punctuation errors you see are in the original published text. I did correct a few obvious typesetter mistakes. My grandmother was not a professional writer and the editor, proofreader and typesetter made their mistakes but Celeska is quite readable. I would like to thank the San Antonio Public Library for very kindly supplying copies of two pages that were damaged in the copy I have. Transcribed by David Garland Edwards in March 2018 from an original published copy of Celeska.