Question of the Week: What’s your preferred style of firsthand account?
What is your preference when reading firsthand accounts from Civil War participants: their letters, their diary, or their memoirs?
What is your preference when reading firsthand accounts from Civil War participants: their letters, their diary, or their memoirs?
Letters and diaries because they are the most immediate.
I prefer letters because it gives me a frame of reference for who the letter is intended, while memorize tend to capture the political ideas and influences of the era in which the reminiscences were written as well as stated memory. Diaries are outstanding because it’s up-to-the-minute but can sometimes be hard to put in context. Really all primary sources are highly desired especially from the Trans-Mississippi theater where official records may be difficult or nonexistent to obtain.
Of the three, my choice is probably their diaries. They are usually written con?tem?po?ra?ne?ous?ly and I’m guessing with less embellishment.
To be sure, the diaries are great for “real time” writing. My ancestor’s diary is astonishing for its accuracy, considering being just 1 man in 100,000 in the midst of major battles and not having access to any kind of general information at the time or in the day(s) afterward.
Mostly those written by the person who was involved with the action or event
Diaries are best because they’re usually closest to the event in question. The farther in time the entry is from the event described, the less reliable. For example, the diary of Samuel Gilpin in the eastern battalion of the 3rd Indiana Cavalry was filled in for June 22-July 1, 1864 (the dates of the Wilson-Kautz (cavalry) Raid into Southern Virginia but not until July 1, which renders the entries less reliable than the diary of, say, R. Allen in the 22nd New York Cavalry, who made his entries on the dates the events he described occurred, or no later than the day afterward. Letters tend to be more temporally distant than diary entries and memoirs more distant still. The more the distance, the less reliability.
All these memoir methods have something to offer. I found over 50 really distinct, unique eyewitness accounts while writing “The Greatest Escape, a True American Civil War Adventure” because, luckily for me, it was an officers’ prison so every inmate was quite literate.
A big key was WHEN the memories were set down. I had accounts recorded only months after the escape, and others written over the next 40 years. The ones closest to the event were much more angry than the ones put down after decades of reflection. But ALL these accounts were extremely lively because the writers were recording one of the most exciting events of their lives. All the accounts had something to offer because each man (along with spy Elizabeth Van Lew) had adventures that were not only unique, but of the “you can’t make this stuff” variety! (Which is why we love first-person accounts!)
Letters, though given the erratic nature of literacy at the time, especially among those not officers, it can be a bit daunting!
After Action reports should probably be included as well. I’d say it depends on the personality of the writer as to which format in how he best reveals himself. In general, I have found that, undoubtedly due to prevailing American culture at the time, soldiers were not too expressive or reflective in their diary accounts; they were very much a simple recording of physical things performed that day, with no space for emotions. One happy exception was my ancestor, a Federal soldier, who kept the most remarkable CW diary I’ve ever read. He was enormously talented as a writer, with a vast vocabulary, and was highly observant and witty. After Action reports tend to be stiff and concise; memoirs tend to be rosy and self-justifying; it was perhaps letters in which CW soldiers revealed their thoughts and emotions the most, and thus those would be my favorite. But due to my ancestor’s case, his diary entries are my favorite.
For that matter, for anyone who loves to read history and good writing, I cannot recommend highly enough the memoir ‘No Parachute’ by Arthur Stanley Gould Lee. A Royal Flying Corps pilot (he stayed in the RAF through the end of World War II) who flew Sopwith Pups and Camels with 46 Squadron from the spring to the winter of 1917, Lee waited until 50 years after the end of the war to write his remarkable memoir, using four different sources: his 1917 flying logbook, the diary he kept at the time, the letters he sent to his wife at the time – with the danger and violence considerably toned down compared to his diary – and his memory and perspective looking back after five decades. He opens the book by admitting that, reading his diary, he doesn’t even recognize the young man who flew and fought in open cockpits at 15,000 feet with no oxygen supply, no heater, and no parachute, and who was shot down three times in one week while ground-strafing – and thought nothing of it. His story is presented with humor, modesty and elegiac writing. With this he fashions the best aviation book to come out of World War I and one of the best military memoirs of all time. It doesn’t matter if you don’t care about history, or aviation, or World War I – his book is a must-read for anyone who enjoys reading first-hand accounts of the human experience.
A great primary source for navy material is the cruise journal, a combination of semi-official record of daily events on board a ship at sea and personal diary. Ships were required to maintain official logs, but officers and midshipmen (officer trainees) maintained their own journals for personal records and training while adding their own thoughts. Better than a memoir or post-action report as they are usually near real time. I had several of these to weave together for the story of the CSS Shenandoah and they provided very personal and very immediate narrative.
I think letters because they contain more emotion.
Letters and diary comments as they were the most accurate and least prone to memory fade.