Journal of the Jackson Purchase Historical Society
"A reader finds a vivid picture of life in a city where both factions, Union and Confederate, found support."
Book Description
Frances Peter was nineteen when she began recording her impressions of the Civil War. Her candid diary includes information concerning the alternating roughness and kindness of soldiers, dances and other entertainments, rumors of troop movements, the difficulties of life in an occupied city, and changes in attitude among the slave population following the Emancipation Proclamation.
As troops from both North and South took turns occupying Lexington, Peter repeatedly emphasized the rightness of the Union cause and minced no words in expressing her disdain for the hated “secesh.” Until her death by epileptic seizure in August, 1864, she conscientiously recorded her account of a torn and divided region, providing invaluable insights and a unique feminist perspective on an underappreciated aspect of the war.
