Shadows on My Heart: The Civil War Diary of Lucy Rebecca Buck of Virginia

by Lucy Rebecca Buck, Elizabeth R. Baer (Editor)

Overview

When the Civil War began in 1861 Lucy Rebecca Buck was the eighteen-year-old daughter of a prosperous planter, living on her family's plantation in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley. On Christmas Day of that year she began a diary which she would keep for the duration of the war, during which time troops were quartered in her home and battles were literally waged in her front yard.

This extraordinary chronicle mirrors the experience of many women torn between loyalty to the Confederate cause and dissatisfaction with the unrealistic ideology of white southern womanhood. In powerful, unsentimental language, Buck's diary reveals her anger and ambivalence about the challenges thrust upon her by the upheaval of her self, her family, and the world as she knew it. This document provides an extraordinary glimpse into the "shadows on the heart" of both Lucy Buck and the American South.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780820340906
Publisher:	University of Georgia Press
Publication date:	02/28/2012
Series:	Southern Voices from the Past: Women's Letters, Diaries, and Writings Series
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	400
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.90(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

ELIZABETH R. BAER is Dean of Faculty and Vice President of Academic Affairs at Gustavus Adolphus College.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments xiii

Introduction xv

Editorial Policies: Creating This Edition xxxiii

Family Members and Other Principals xxxvii

The Diary of Lucy Rebecca Buck, 1861-1865

Chapter 1 I Cannot but Feel a Little Sad December 25, 1861-May 13, 1862 3

Chapter 2 "Headquarters" Was Duly Established at Bel Air May 14, 1862-June 20, 1862 68

Chapter 3 We Learned to Accommodate Ourselves to Circumstances June 21, 1862-December 31, 1862 111

Chapter 4 And Now a New Page Is Spread Before Us January 1, 1863-June 8, 1863 171

Chapter 5 Very, Very Footsore and Weary June 9, 1863-December 31, 1863 208

Chapter 6 One Day in the Very Heart of Our Army the Next Abandoned in the Hands of the Yankees January 2, 1864-June 6, 1864 261

Chapter 7 Wish I Could Hear from Home June 7, 1864-August 26, 1864 279

Chapter 8 Given Up into the Hands of Our Foes September 1, 1864-April 15, 1865 303

Epilogue 321

Appendix: Lucy Buck's Reading Materials 325

Notes 331

Selected Bibliography 345

Index 351

Editorial Reviews

Yields a rare insight into the heart of one Southern woman whose primary pre-war purpose was to serve her societal role.

Civil War History

In Baer's fine new edition, Lucy Buck's voice is fascinating. Through her absorbing account, we witness the disintegration of the confederacy.

author of Tara Revisited - Catherine Clinton

"In Baer's fine new edition, Lucy Buck's voice is fascinating. Through her absorbing account, we witness the disintegration of the confederacy."--Catherine Clinton, author of Tara Revisited

"Yields a rare insight into the heart of one Southern woman whose primary pre-war purpose was to serve her societal role."--Civil War History

From the Publisher