author
Jonathan Prince Cilley
1835–1920
A Civil War officer, lawyer, and traveler, he left behind a lively record of 19th-century adventure. His best-known book follows a Bowdoin College expedition to Labrador, mixing curiosity, landscape, and firsthand observation.
1 Audiobook
About the author
Born in Thomaston, Maine, on December 29, 1835, he was the son of Congressman Jonathan Cilley and Deborah Prince Cilley. He graduated from Bowdoin College in 1858, studied law, and was admitted to the bar before the Civil War.
When war came, he joined the 1st Maine Cavalry and rose through the ranks, later receiving the brevet rank of brigadier general. That military career became a major part of how he was remembered, but he also wrote and preserved family history, including a genealogy of the Cilley family.
For readers, his most appealing work is Bowdoin Boys in Labrador (1890), an account of a scientific expedition led by Professor Leslie A. Lee. It shows him not only as a veteran and public-minded New Englander, but also as an observant narrator interested in travel, natural history, and the experience of exploration. He died in California in April 1920.