Play in Mt. Hope Casts Spotlight on Prewar America ROCHESTER, NY (WXXI) - Since the events of September 11th, there¿s been a great deal of discussion about America¿s new war in on terrorism. It¿s unclear, however, how the new war will unfold or how long it will last.

Here in Rochester, a troupe of actors is putting on a play about another uncertain time in American history: 1860, just before the outbreak of the Civil War. The play ¿A Circle of Friends¿ suggests that history is repeating itself in our time.

¿A Circle of Friends¿ is produced by the Friends of Mt. Hope Cemetery and the Rochester Museum and Science Center. Audience members walk from grave to grave with actors on their way to visit abolitionist Frederick Douglass and his wife Anna Murray who are, as the play goes, grieving by the grave of their daughter.

Larry Hudson, who teaches American history and directs the Frederick Douglas Institute at the University of Rochester, says that current discussion of the new war on terrorism remind him of this time in late 1860. Like our current President, Abraham Lincoln was then an untested leader that people didn¿t really trust. And, Hudson says, Americans in 1860 were optimistic that they would win the coming war.

But Frederick Douglass, Hudson says, knew better. He sensed that the coming Civil War would be a long and bloody fight.

One spectator said, ¿I think I was struck most by Frederick Douglass¿s words about what might be ahead for us at that time in terms of war or peace and in the context of today. I wonder what¿s ahead for us in terms of war or peace. I only hope that the outcome for us now is as good as perhaps the final outcome of what occurred back then.¿

For him, ¿A Circle of Friends¿ illustrated the power of resolve in an era when the enemy was much closer to home.

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