A Philadelphia perspective : the Civil War diary of Sidney George Fisher
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
A Philadelphia perspective : the Civil War diary of Sidney George Fisher
(The North's Civil War)
Fordham University Press, 2007
- : cloth
Available at 1 libraries
  Aomori
  Iwate
  Miyagi
  Akita
  Yamagata
  Fukushima
  Ibaraki
  Tochigi
  Gunma
  Saitama
  Chiba
  Tokyo
  Kanagawa
  Niigata
  Toyama
  Ishikawa
  Fukui
  Yamanashi
  Nagano
  Gifu
  Shizuoka
  Aichi
  Mie
  Shiga
  Kyoto
  Osaka
  Hyogo
  Nara
  Wakayama
  Tottori
  Shimane
  Okayama
  Hiroshima
  Yamaguchi
  Tokushima
  Kagawa
  Ehime
  Kochi
  Fukuoka
  Saga
  Nagasaki
  Kumamoto
  Oita
  Miyazaki
  Kagoshima
  Okinawa
  Korea
  China
  Thailand
  United Kingdom
  Germany
  Switzerland
  France
  Belgium
  Netherlands
  Sweden
  Norway
  United States of America
Note
"Portions of this book have been adapted from A Philadelphia Perspective: The Diary of Sidney George Fisher, Covering the Years 1834-1871, edited by Nicholas B. Wainwright (Philadelphia: Historical Society of Pennsylvania, 1967)"--T.p. verso
Includes bibliographical references and index
Description and Table of Contents
Description
"Invaluable...many insights into the life and thought of the nineteenth century.... [Fisher's] comments are stimulating, often barbed....the narrative is smooth-flowing and fascinating."-American Historical Review
"An important literary event....an invaluable historical source. Unexcelled."
-Pennsylvania History
"Fisher was an astute and acerbic commentator on politics and society in Philadelphia, Washington, and the country as a whole during the Civil War. While legal, historical, and literary scholars will mine this diary for its penetrating insights, lovers of history will delight in Fisher's ability to record the quotidian and the monumental with clarity, force, and lasting effect."-Herman Belz, University of Maryland
"An indispensable source for the Northern home front during the Civil War."-Mark E. Neely, Jr., The Pennsylvania State University
An aristocratic member of a prominent Philadelphia family, Sidney George Fisher (1809-1871) was a prolific man of letters. Between 1834 and 1871, he kept a detailed diary that chronicled not only daily life in America's second city but also the key political, social, and cultural events of the nineteenth century. Published in 1967, Fisher's diary quickly became one of the most remarkable works of its kind; few published diaries are as incisive and illuminating of their era.
This book makes available once again the pages of Fisher's diary written during the Civil War. As he wrote on November 9, 1861, "My diary has become little else than a record of the events of the war, which occupies all thoughts and conversation." His "record of the events" is a uniquely valuable portrait of a city, and a nation, at war. Fisher recorded everything from conversations on street corners to arrests of civilians for treason (including some members of his family), critiques of partisan speeches and pamphlets to descriptions of battles, accounts of runaway slaves, and tales of mob violence. At the same time, he reports on dinners, parties, weddings, and funerals among the city's elite.
Brilliant journalism, the Diary is rich with Fisher's own observations- on secession, war and peace, on his admiration for Lincoln and his complicated feelings about slavery and emancipation.
The Diary, with a new introduction by Jonathan W. White, joins those of George Templeton Strong and Mary Boykin Chesnut as classic windows on American life
During the War Between the States.
Jonathan W. White's articles on Civil War politics have appeared in such journals as Civil War History, American Nineteenth Century History, The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, and Pennsylvania History. Awarded a John T. Hubbell prize for the best article in Civil War History, he is a doctoral candidate in history at the University of Maryland, College Park.
Cover illustrations:
Cover design by
Fordham University Press
New York
www.fordhampress.com
by "Nielsen BookData"