re: What are you reading?

The War Outside My Window: The Civil War Diary of Leroy Wiley Gresham

Leroy Gresham was a 12 year old boy living in Macon, GA who began a diary shortly before the Civil War began and continued over 7 volumes until just after the war's end, when he died of spinal tuberculosis.

This diary was pretty much unknown outside of his descendants, but was eventually donated to the Library of Congress in the 1980's and finally published this month.

It's an interesting primary source of civil war era history. Even though he was young, he was an avid reader and read everything he could get his hands on for the latest Civil War news. He was pretty much confined to his bedroom due to an accident that crushed one of his legs at the age of 10, so reading and playing chess were about the only things he did.

The book contains a lot of citations that add context to his writings, but you can view the original hand-written source at the online Library of Congress.