Customer Reviews

Lucy Breckinridge of Grove Hill: The Journal of a Virginia Girl, 1862-1864 (Women's Diaries & Letters of the Nineteenth-Century South)

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For those of you like me who are not general history buffs but enjoy personal stories from bygone eras, this is a wonderful book. Reading along with Lucy, sharing her joys and pain during the days of the Civil War, she becomes a friend, and we her confidante. I highly recommend this book for anyone interested in the Civil War, particularly women's views. In reading her story, we can relive a piece of America's past through the eyes of a young woman.

Maybe it's the name we share; maybe it's that we both hail from the Valley in Virginia....I really like this book. I doubt Lucy Breckenridge could have imagined her forthright, honest and innocent comments would survive, much less impact a reader with such treasure of insight and sharing of like feelings--regardless of the time passed. Sometimes a teenager; often a woman wise far beyond her few years. At once, new and intriguing glance backward, while a more than passing look inside ourselves. I'm so grateful she hid it in her skirts when the Federal troops----oh, you'll need to read it all yourself!

The diary is an excellent way to look into the eyes of a young woman during the Civil War years. She sounds like a typical teenager today, writing about boys, socializing, familys issues, lonliness, happiness, body image, sexuality, and just life in general; however, it also contains information related to the time, such as her views on slavery and the war. Unfortunately, what is missing from this book is an historical examination into the people, places, and events she wrote about.