Recently I had the opportunity to read excerpts from a diary written by Georgina Francis Barrett Devlin. She was born in 1852 and lived until 1912. In her diary she helps us readers to visualize what it was like to live in Mississippi during the Civil War and after its devastating effects on the South. We get glimpses of what it was like to be a woman during that time raising children and participating in the community. The diary was transcribed and edited by Katharine M. Jones and the author of the diary was her ancestor. If you’re a fan of history and have always wanted to travel back in time and see things first hand, I think this diary is the next best thing. Here’s a brief description by the publisher about the book.
“In 1852 Georgina F. Devlin was a young English immigrant with two small children when she began to keep a record of her life. She continued until 1912, when she was a great grandmother living with her widowed daughter and her family. She noted both items of historic interest and of everyday happenings within her large family. She recorded the Civil War swirling around the home in Yazoo County, Mississippi, when she and the children hid in the woods and her husband's cotton was burned. She visited her brothers in Canada and saw the famous tight-rope walker "Blondin" cross Niagara Falls. She went from traveling in a stage coach, to riding on a streetcar, to riding in her son-in-law's automobile. This well footnoted diary will be of interest to anyone with a particularly interest in Southern history, the Civil War, and the developments of rural and small town life during this period.”
The book is available on Amazon. The title of the book is “The Diary of a Southern Lady: Georgina Francis Barrett Devlin, 1852-1912.” To read more about the book I suggest the following link:
The Diary of a Southern Lady: Georgina Francis Barrett Devlin, 1852-1912
