Surviving the Confederacy: Rebellion, Ruin, and Recovery--Roger and Sara Pryor During the Civil War

An excellent book in not only the telling of Civil War history, but of immersing oneself in the characters of Roger and Sara Pryor. Their hardships and sufferings were shared by a generation during those calamitous years and the way they bore them was truly inspiring. Their faith in God always guided them in their duties and responsibilities to each other and their fellow man. Their self-denial, especially Sara's, struck me deeply. This is a remarkable lesson in the contrasting of cultures of how people of high moral fiber lived then to how we live now.

I usually read fiction. I read this book on a recommendation and loved it. It reads like a novel, but is all the more touching because it is true. he Pryors must have been remarkable people.

I buy a lot of books. It's my addiction. Only difference between a book addiction and drinking is I still have the book with me the next morning and no headache despite lapping up the intoxicating verbiage all night. Most Civil War books I read are pedestrian, fulfilling a utilitarian need, but oh sometimes, I stumble on a page turner where the writing is so extraordinary it breathes life and color into even small and inconsequential events. Though I resisted it for several years, "Class of 1846" by John Waugh turned out to be a page turner and I adored his Re-electing Lincoln as well. This week I discovered "Surviving the Confederacy" Waugh's new book. Sara and Roger Pryor are the heart of the book, which celebrates the vigor and vinegar of southerners as war promised better things and then failed to bring them the promised tomorrow. The Pryors were the quintessential, noble, charming and eloquent southerners, perfect examples of Virginia's gracious and cultured society. Roger was an author, lawyer, general and ardent secessionist while Sara was his devoted helpmate. Just as it should be! But not quite. The beautiful Sara was different from the ordinary belle. She was a well educated and independent woman with a talent for writing and definitely a survivor. Sara managed to navigate the horror of war and come out a survivor. I was already familiar with Sara Pryor's writing and was thrilled to find a book in which she was the focal point. Sara's book "My Day: Reminiscences of a Long Life" has always been one of my favorites. Her plaintive memory of the long siege at Petersburg was filled with the immediacy of the moment and yet carried a tiny seed of optimism void of recriminations, "With all our starvation we never ate rats, mice, or mule meat. We managed to exist on peas, bread, and sorghum. We could buy a little milk, and we mixed it with a drink made from roasted and ground corn. The latter, in the grain, was scarce. Mr. Campbell's children picked up the grains wherever the army horses were fed, washed, dried, and pounded them for food." Surviving the Confederacy is definitely a grabber. Waugh's writing style and perfect pacing, which captured my imagination in his two previous books is just as riveting and vivid in Surviving the Confederacy. "Sara's general impression of her growing-up years was of gardens . . . For Sara it was as if fairies, mounted on butterflies, visited each flower and painted it in the night. She was a dreamer. It was a time when living rooms were called parlors, and when the grown-ups gathered there and talked of politics or religion or slavery. At such times Sara retired into the inner chambers of her imagination." [pg 15]. How can you resist?