On the night of March 11, 1862, as the heavy tramp of Confederate marching troops died away in the distance--her husband's regiment among them--Cornelia Peake McDonald began her diary of events in war-torn Winchester, Virginia.
McDonald's story of the Civil War records a personal and distinctly female battle of her own--a southern woman's lonely struggle in the midst of chaos to provide safety and shelter for herself and her children. For McDonald,...