Sarah Morgan: The Civil War Diary of a Southern Woman

by Sarah Morgan Dawson

Book Overview

Born into one of the best families of Baton Rouge, Sarah Morgan was not yet twenty when she began her diary in January 1862, nine months after the start of the Civil War. She was soon to experience a coming-of-age filled with the turmoil and upheaval that devastated the wartime South. She set down the Remarkable events of the war in a record that remains one of the most vivid, evocative portrayals in existence of a time and place that today make up...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0671785036
• ISBN13: 9780671785031
• Release Date: October 1992
• Publisher: Touchstone Books
• Length: 672 Pages
• Weight: 1.77 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.7" x 6.2" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

I love this book

I love this book..I recommend it to anyone else who likes history

An Interesting Story of a Southern Woman!!

This was a wonderful book! Sarah Morgan was a very interesting woman. I love learning about the War Between the States, so this book is a wonderful addition to my collection! I would recommend this book to anyone who would like a view on a person who wasn't into the political sphere, but into the daily home life. Sarah Morgan was a delight to read about, and at times funny. Her modesty was one of great surprise to me and, although I agree with her reasons for not wanting to kiss, I thought she took the arm-around-the-waist a little too far! :-) Regardless, I highly recommend this book!!! Katie McCurdy (Author of `Journey of Faith)

The Real Scarlett O'Hara

Sarah Morgan is the real Scarlett O'Hara. As the world as she had known it crumbled to ashes around her, she had hardships she had never even dreamed of in her upper class society before the War. She knew nothing of the harshness of slavery or of the stuggles of others outside her own crumbling world. It is a beautiful narrative, an historical treasure and she is a gifted writer beyond her years. The description of the death of her father brings me to tears every time.

Defense of Sarah Morgan's Diary

Well, I never thought I'd be writing one of these, but the last two reviews, being grossly unfair, inspired me. I read Sarah Morgan's diary about two years ago, so this is coming from memory. Whatever one may think of Ms. Morgan as a person (and judging her from contemporary standards would surely be a mistake), she was for her age extremely well-educated and articulate. Her prose is, in comparison to most today, exceptional (again, especially for her age). The same can be said of her insight (which, of course, for any person of her age, is by no means beyond reproach). Aside from constituting a valuable guide to the mind of a young southern woman during the Civil War, her story (which is anything but dull) provides historical context and perspective to the union army's ascent up the Mississippi. Without knowing something of this military campaign, I can see how another reader might not enjoy her diary. Lastly, Ms. Morgan was truly a feminist -- a word I do not particularly care for as it seems to overly excite some and unduly offend others. She was, like most women of her time, a product of a male-dominated society. She questions this society in her diary and, if I recall correctly from the preface, led her later years in a way most feminists of today would be proud. Nothing but enjoyable reading here.

Beautifully written

When reading this superb Civil War diary the reader is immediately struck by two things. One, it is hard to believe that so young a woman could have expressed herself and her feelings so beautifully, and two, it is even more amazing that everything contain in this diary is exactly as Sarah Morgan wrote it originally. That is to say, it was not polished and edited afterwards (as Mary Chestnut intended to do, but was not able). If you want to take a glimpse at what living through four years of war was like for a Southern family and especially a young Southern woman you need look no further.

Intimate, vivid and unforgettable!

What an amazing book! To read this book is to take a trip back intime. Not a politically correct book, but the diaries of a complexyoung woman who was haughty and kind, flirtatious and proper,deferential to men and determined to be an independent spinster. SarahMorgan was a rebel in terms of both her Southern heritage and herpre-feminism beliefs. Her words depict a white world-view that doesn'trecognize its own racism, as well as her personal defiance ofsociety's expectations of her as a woman. She was a talented writerwith opinions that varied from modern, by today's standards, tocripplingly in sync with the standards of 1860s Louisiana. As a CivilWar book, as a woman's memoir, and as a journey into one of the UnitedStates' most fascinating and tragic times, this book is trulyoutstanding.