Nathaniel Starbuck

Nathaniel Starbuck is a fictional character, Confederate soldier, and the protagonist of British author Bernard Cornwell's (b. 1944), "Starbuck Chronicles" series of novels of historical fiction. Cornwell is also author of several other series of historical fiction such as the "Richard Sharpe" novels of the British campaigns in the Peninsular War in Spain during the Napoleonic Wars of the early 19th Century.

Starbuck is born in Boston, Massachusetts, the son of radical abolitionist minister Reverend Dr. Elial Starbuck. He lives a relatively pious childhood, and is regularly beaten by his father, which leaves him unprepared for the outside world.

Starbuck goes to the Yale Seminary, in New Haven, Connecticut, as his father hopes he will follow him into the ministry. Here Starbuck meets several notable figures, including the well-known Oliver Wendell Holmes, (1809-1894), [physician, poet, professor, author] and his equally famous son Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., (1841-1935), (Union Army officer and future U.S. Supreme Court justice). He also meets his close friend Adam Faulconer, who is also studying at Yale seminary.

After becoming enamored with an actress, Starbuck drops out of school to run away with her. Unfortunately, the actress scams both Starbuck and her boyfriend/director. With all of his money gone, Starbuck goes to Virginia to seek aid from Faulconer. However, before he can get to Faulconer's house, news of the attack on Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor in South Carolina in April 1861 causes a riot to break out in the streets. The crowd grabs Starbuck and another man, who turns out to be a dentist from the North. The crowd then proceeds to tar and feather the dentist, and are planning to do the same to Starbuck when Adam Faulconer's father, Washington Faulconer, rides in and saves him.

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