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Wisconsin Studies in Autobiography
A Woman's Civil War: A Diary, with Reminiscences of the War, from March 1862
Cornelia Peake McDonald's story of the Civil War records a personal and distinctly female battle: a southern woman's lonely struggle in the midst of chaos to provide safety and shelter for herself and her nine children as their home is destroyed by the forces of war. Whether describing a Union soldier's theft of her Christmas cakes, the discovery of a human foot in her garden, or the death of her daughter, her story of the Civil War at home is compelling and disturbing. Her tremendous determination and unyielding spirit is a testimony to a woman's will to preserve her family.
303 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1992
163 people want to read
About the author
Cornelia Peake Mcdonald
4 booksCornelia Peake McDonald (June 14, 1822 – January 11, 1909) was an American diarist who was the author of A Diary with Reminiscences of the War and Refugee Life in the Shenandoah Valley, 1860-1865 in which she recaps her life as a woman living in Winchester, Virginia. Her writing is significant as it recaps the views of the American Civil War from the point of a view of a woman living in one of the most counter occupied towns of the conflict. She became known as one of the "Devil Diarists of Winchester."
Peake was born in 1822 in Alexandria, Virginia. She was the youngest of six children of Dr. Humphrey Peake and Annie Linton Lane. She married Angus William McDonald in 1847 in Hannibal, Missouri. The couple would have nine children.
During the Civil War, her husband was away from Winchester serving as the colonel of the 7th Virginia Infantry, leaving Cornelia to stay home with the children. (He would die in December 1864, leaving her a widow.) She kept a detailed diary during the Civil War, which was published in 1875, with a second edition in 1934. It was reprinted in 2003.
She was buried beside her husband in Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond, Virginia.
Biographical information from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Peake was born in 1822 in Alexandria, Virginia. She was the youngest of six children of Dr. Humphrey Peake and Annie Linton Lane. She married Angus William McDonald in 1847 in Hannibal, Missouri. The couple would have nine children.
During the Civil War, her husband was away from Winchester serving as the colonel of the 7th Virginia Infantry, leaving Cornelia to stay home with the children. (He would die in December 1864, leaving her a widow.) She kept a detailed diary during the Civil War, which was published in 1875, with a second edition in 1934. It was reprinted in 2003.
She was buried beside her husband in Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond, Virginia.
Biographical information from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
September 21, 2020
Second Time Read. Review to Come.
January 30, 2010
Cornelia Peake McDonald kept a detailed diary of events at home while her husband went off to fight in the Civil War. If you ever wondered what life was like at home during that struggle, for American living under what they considered to be "occupation" this book will detail exactly what it was like. For history buffs, this is a fabulous treasure trove of information, if at times a bit whiny. For people who are waiting for loved ones in harm's way even today, the examples of courage, fear and strength are an inspiration. This IS the story of The Civil War at Home.
March 18, 2020
Honestly, this book would be an amazing one except for the introduction by someone whose games of intersectionality and whose gender studies approach makes this book more of a chore to read than it otherwise would be. If you want to enjoy this work and you have little tolerance for leftist political shenanigans, you would be best advised to skip the introduction and the tortured way that the author tries to cheer on the strange form of this work as being a revolutionary step for female authors and how the editor tries to downplay the pro-Confederate worldview of its plucky authoress, and get straight to Mrs. McDonald's excellent writing for yourself. This is a strange book which is part diary kept to please the author's husband, who was a general officer with the Confederacy, as she lived on the front lines of the conflict in Winchester, and then a reminiscence of the end of the war after her exile and the death of her husband made the original purpose no longer necessary, and then reminisces of the beginning of the war that talk about happier and more glorious times for a Confederate widow like the author.
This book is more than 250 pages long and it begins with acknowledgements and an introduction that appears to be written for the express purpose of making the memoir and reminisces of a Confederate war widow acceptable for contemporary feminist audiences. The editor fails to account for the general Civil War interest that this book would have for someone who finds her perspective to be rubbish at best. Fortunately, though, this is only about 20 pages of garbage and the rest of the book ends up being a very interesting read. The diary begins with a preface and then continues until she becomes a refugee in the summer of 1863 after Gettysburg. The loss of her diary and then, after that, the loss of her husband led her to then write a pretend diary based on her memories after the war, where she then sought to make sense of her poverty as a refugee. And then, after discussing the end of the war, she returns to recollect 1861 when the war could still seem glorious to a proud Virginian woman who had lost so much in the course of one of the worst causes for which men ever fought and died.
Indeed, the strange structure of this work is precisely what one would expect for a work written to appeal to Confederates. The end of the Civil War was a grim time--and it was certainly grim for the writer, who had to beg for food so that she and her children could survive as refugees from the war-torn Shenandoah Valley, and the way that the book ends in the period before the beginning of the diary proper in March 1862 shows the author deliberately trying to remember the happier times before everything got so grim. This is a book whose perspective is not one I particularly enjoy or agree with, but the author has such brave spirit and such loyalty to a doomed and foolish cause and ultimately such humanity despite the loss of her pride and dignity and social station and husband and one of her babies and so on and so forth that it is impossible not to admire and respect the author as she saucily deals with Yankees she despises and reflects upon the ruin of her comfortable middle class existence as the second wife of a Virginian professional. And any book that provides a thoughtful perspective, even one that one happens to disagree with, is certainly worth appreciating when it is written with such verve and spirit as this one is.
This book is more than 250 pages long and it begins with acknowledgements and an introduction that appears to be written for the express purpose of making the memoir and reminisces of a Confederate war widow acceptable for contemporary feminist audiences. The editor fails to account for the general Civil War interest that this book would have for someone who finds her perspective to be rubbish at best. Fortunately, though, this is only about 20 pages of garbage and the rest of the book ends up being a very interesting read. The diary begins with a preface and then continues until she becomes a refugee in the summer of 1863 after Gettysburg. The loss of her diary and then, after that, the loss of her husband led her to then write a pretend diary based on her memories after the war, where she then sought to make sense of her poverty as a refugee. And then, after discussing the end of the war, she returns to recollect 1861 when the war could still seem glorious to a proud Virginian woman who had lost so much in the course of one of the worst causes for which men ever fought and died.
Indeed, the strange structure of this work is precisely what one would expect for a work written to appeal to Confederates. The end of the Civil War was a grim time--and it was certainly grim for the writer, who had to beg for food so that she and her children could survive as refugees from the war-torn Shenandoah Valley, and the way that the book ends in the period before the beginning of the diary proper in March 1862 shows the author deliberately trying to remember the happier times before everything got so grim. This is a book whose perspective is not one I particularly enjoy or agree with, but the author has such brave spirit and such loyalty to a doomed and foolish cause and ultimately such humanity despite the loss of her pride and dignity and social station and husband and one of her babies and so on and so forth that it is impossible not to admire and respect the author as she saucily deals with Yankees she despises and reflects upon the ruin of her comfortable middle class existence as the second wife of a Virginian professional. And any book that provides a thoughtful perspective, even one that one happens to disagree with, is certainly worth appreciating when it is written with such verve and spirit as this one is.
November 2, 2023
Interesting first person account of life 'at home' during the Civil war in Northern VA where the territory changed hands again and again. I am distantly related to Cornelia so I was particularly interested in her experiences.
April 25, 2025
Fascinating. Many insights into Civil-War era life when you're a mom of many children and your husband is away. Connections to my area (Hampshire County, WV) and characters I know of (Porte Crayon, Stonewall Jackson).
June 20, 2018
I didn't finish...I was expecting more detail about home life and such but it ended up with too much war detail for me :( Sad story, some great poetry too.
April 3, 2025
this prompted me to learn more about Winchester, VA during the Civil War. Did additional research and gained more insight into the civilian live of the confederacy.
December 8, 2009
"A Woman's Civil War" was a fascinating view of the American Civil War through the eyes of a Confederate civilian. Cornelia lived in a town that was captured by the Union, then freed by the Confederates, then captured again by the Union, and then freed again. She described the events with vivid details that made me feel as if I were watching the events unfold.
There was a lot of suspense due to the constant uncertainty of what would happen in the next day, or even in the next minute. Would the Union soldiers take all of her food? Her house? How would she get more supplies when she refused to swear a loyalty oath to the Union general making his headquarters in town? How would they get firewood when their trees and all of their out-buildings were demolished for Union fires? Would the battle rolling over their front yard end in tragedy for the family or freedom from occupation?
Her diary showed what life was like near the battle fields and under occupation for a well-to-do gentlewoman with nine children and a husband who was a Confederate officer. Her expectations in how she would be treated by friend and foe alike showed the differences in manners back then...and how those manners changed over the course of the war. Her comments also showed how people at the time viewed the war and how the "why we're fighting" changed somewhat over time. Some of her remarks reminded me of things still being said today.
In the Reminiscences section (which picks up were the diary ends), she lived for a time in an area relatively untouched by war. It was interesting to see the contrasts with what she'd become used to.
Since she wrote this diary for her husband and later for her children, she sometimes didn't include information that they would have known. She also sometimes related news as she heard it that was incorrect. However, there were endnotes at the back that gave the correct or needed information on battles, events, who various people were, and information about them.
Cornelia did refer to God and think over Christian theology as it related to her dead child and events around her. I found her thoughts an interesting part of the overall book.
I'd highly recommend this well-written and fascinating book to history buffs, those interested in the Civil War, and to anyone who thinks it sounds interesting.
There was a lot of suspense due to the constant uncertainty of what would happen in the next day, or even in the next minute. Would the Union soldiers take all of her food? Her house? How would she get more supplies when she refused to swear a loyalty oath to the Union general making his headquarters in town? How would they get firewood when their trees and all of their out-buildings were demolished for Union fires? Would the battle rolling over their front yard end in tragedy for the family or freedom from occupation?
Her diary showed what life was like near the battle fields and under occupation for a well-to-do gentlewoman with nine children and a husband who was a Confederate officer. Her expectations in how she would be treated by friend and foe alike showed the differences in manners back then...and how those manners changed over the course of the war. Her comments also showed how people at the time viewed the war and how the "why we're fighting" changed somewhat over time. Some of her remarks reminded me of things still being said today.
In the Reminiscences section (which picks up were the diary ends), she lived for a time in an area relatively untouched by war. It was interesting to see the contrasts with what she'd become used to.
Since she wrote this diary for her husband and later for her children, she sometimes didn't include information that they would have known. She also sometimes related news as she heard it that was incorrect. However, there were endnotes at the back that gave the correct or needed information on battles, events, who various people were, and information about them.
Cornelia did refer to God and think over Christian theology as it related to her dead child and events around her. I found her thoughts an interesting part of the overall book.
I'd highly recommend this well-written and fascinating book to history buffs, those interested in the Civil War, and to anyone who thinks it sounds interesting.
January 19, 2014
With few exceptions, until very recently, war stories have mostly been men's to tell. They, after all, have been the active participants; throughout most of history; they are the ones, for the most part, who made, fought, bled in, died in and ended wars. And their chronicles about it are primarily filled with bravery (or bravado), gallantry (or cowardice), but almost always action and adventure. But what about the women on both sides of any war who had to endure whatever the war brought?
This book contains the diary entries and recollections of a middle class woman living in northwestern Virginia during the American Civil War. Her husband asked her to keep a detailed journal while he was off fighting and so she did. Left at home in Winchester with their nine children and five of her nine stepchildren who were still at home, she faithfully chronicled the day to day events as the war came near and through Winchester, as tides turned there again and again. Almost from the beginning the town became a staging ground for the Confederates preparing and then fighting in battles nearby. It housed the wounded and dying from those battles. Then it was occupied by the North, re-won by the South, occupied again by the North, briefly fought over and held by the South, and finally utterly destroyed by North. She and her children took to the road as refugees, eventually "settling" in Lexington, VA, where she learned that her husband, Angus, had been killed near the end of the war.
The book is a monument to endurance. This was clearly NOT a war of her making. At the onset, she makes it quite clear, she mostly sympathized with the northern perspective. She couldn't imagine the United States being un-united. Like the vast majority of Southerners, the McDonalds did not hold a great number of slaves, though, like many middle class whites, they had two domestic servants they "rented" from their masters. But as she experiences the war directly, scrambling to find ways to survive, the war itself becomes personal, "the enemy" largely depersonalized. Everything around her falls apart, and yet she must somehow manage to continue for her own sake and the sakes of the fourteen children she is trying to protect -- any way she can.
It's a woman's war story and, for the sake of peace, it ought to be read by everyone.
This book contains the diary entries and recollections of a middle class woman living in northwestern Virginia during the American Civil War. Her husband asked her to keep a detailed journal while he was off fighting and so she did. Left at home in Winchester with their nine children and five of her nine stepchildren who were still at home, she faithfully chronicled the day to day events as the war came near and through Winchester, as tides turned there again and again. Almost from the beginning the town became a staging ground for the Confederates preparing and then fighting in battles nearby. It housed the wounded and dying from those battles. Then it was occupied by the North, re-won by the South, occupied again by the North, briefly fought over and held by the South, and finally utterly destroyed by North. She and her children took to the road as refugees, eventually "settling" in Lexington, VA, where she learned that her husband, Angus, had been killed near the end of the war.
The book is a monument to endurance. This was clearly NOT a war of her making. At the onset, she makes it quite clear, she mostly sympathized with the northern perspective. She couldn't imagine the United States being un-united. Like the vast majority of Southerners, the McDonalds did not hold a great number of slaves, though, like many middle class whites, they had two domestic servants they "rented" from their masters. But as she experiences the war directly, scrambling to find ways to survive, the war itself becomes personal, "the enemy" largely depersonalized. Everything around her falls apart, and yet she must somehow manage to continue for her own sake and the sakes of the fourteen children she is trying to protect -- any way she can.
It's a woman's war story and, for the sake of peace, it ought to be read by everyone.
July 31, 2015
Earlier I read Lucy Buck's diary. She was around 19 and a daughter of the house. This is a contrast in that Cornelia is older, her husband away fighting and she is responsible for keeping her 9 children safe, including food and shelter. Also on her mind are assorted young adult step-children who are in town or away fighting.
The writing is wonderful in that it is rich with visuals because Cornelia is also an artist. Her diary enables her to keep in touch with her feelings in a way that had me in tears more than once. Her heartbreak and strengths are expressed so deeply that she builds a bridge between then and now without self pity. It is an honest view of her life as she lives it. We are with her when she lets down in her writing and then goes out the next day to bargain for food to feed her family. This was yesterday's war, but makes me keenly aware of what multitudes struggle with today globally and at home. At times too close for comfort.
Such literature is something to be grateful for...this view of life back over time. A real life. The past does connect with the present in human terms, both the compassionate and the brutal. And yes, I do admit to be partial to diaries, journals and memoirs for that reason.
The writing is wonderful in that it is rich with visuals because Cornelia is also an artist. Her diary enables her to keep in touch with her feelings in a way that had me in tears more than once. Her heartbreak and strengths are expressed so deeply that she builds a bridge between then and now without self pity. It is an honest view of her life as she lives it. We are with her when she lets down in her writing and then goes out the next day to bargain for food to feed her family. This was yesterday's war, but makes me keenly aware of what multitudes struggle with today globally and at home. At times too close for comfort.
Such literature is something to be grateful for...this view of life back over time. A real life. The past does connect with the present in human terms, both the compassionate and the brutal. And yes, I do admit to be partial to diaries, journals and memoirs for that reason.
June 13, 2010
This book took me a long time to read. In fact, the first time I only got halfway through and put it away for a year before finally reading it through. I've read other Civil War Diaries which kept my interest, but this one was more difficult. I'm not sure why. The book just didn 't flow. There were sections that held my attention, but others I can't even remember. I do appreciate the bravery of this woman who held her family together while the Northern Armies repeatedly tried to turn her home into a hospital. I also appreciate her decision to keep her family together and do whatever she needed to do to provide food and shelter when the war was over. I chose this book while visiting Winchester with my father two years ago. The story mostly takes place in Winchester, where the author and her family own a plantation before the Civil War breaks out.
January 2, 2017
This is the nonfiction version of "Gone With The Wind"! A must read for anyone Civil War fan or not.
It reads like a script for a movie. I use it all the time to remind me sort o because f what it was like to be living during the war. When her little Elizabeth "Bessie" died I was grief stricken. It is amazing how Mrs. McDonald experiences this tragic event but does not stop to really morn she has a big family to provide for she cannot stop to mourn.
Along with Mrs. Chestnut's book a must read > Mrs. Chestnuts book gives you a picture of the movers and shakers of the Civil War in Richmond and S.C.
Mrs. McDonald book shows us how millions lived during the Civil War.
I LOVED this book.
It reads like a script for a movie. I use it all the time to remind me sort o because f what it was like to be living during the war. When her little Elizabeth "Bessie" died I was grief stricken. It is amazing how Mrs. McDonald experiences this tragic event but does not stop to really morn she has a big family to provide for she cannot stop to mourn.
Along with Mrs. Chestnut's book a must read > Mrs. Chestnuts book gives you a picture of the movers and shakers of the Civil War in Richmond and S.C.
Mrs. McDonald book shows us how millions lived during the Civil War.
I LOVED this book.
November 2, 2016
Cornelia's voice will stay in my head for a long time after reading this book. Although there were parts that got a bit tedious...with all the troop movements and names and places, overall this book was really a great way to feel connected to how a mother would handle these incredible, harrowing circumstances. I would have to cry a bit reading about all she lost and trying to survive day by day as the war raged on...wondering where in the world would she find shoes for her little boys with winter coming and then just struggling to find a bite to eat some days!
February 22, 2014
It's a tragic story and one which so many thousands lived through. One interesting thing is that even while Cornelia's village is under siege by enemy soldiers, the two sides still find things to laugh about together in the midst of their daily disputes and struggles. In the middle of chaos and loss, they still get glimpses of the absurdity of their situation.
March 9, 2013
I read a lot of diaries and letters, but I found my attention wandering in this book. I seriously think it was over-edited, which took away the gritty, realistic sound of the writing of the period. Interesting, but not the best.
February 6, 2008
This is a phenomenal book! Absolutely love this book. It is one of my favorite books that I've read on the civil war. Words straight from the mouth of a southern belle.
December 26, 2009
My absolute favorite book read in 2009. Great insight to the war that is rarely covered in other books.
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews