In partnership with the National Park Service, Eastern National will host Janet Elizabeth Croon, editor of The War Outside My Window: The Civil War Diary of LeRoy Wiley Gresham, 1860 – 1865. Ms. Croon will be available Tuesday from 11 a.m.-3 p.m. inside the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center to meet guests and sign copies of her book. This first-hand account of the Civil War details the perspective of a young Georgia boy.
Review for The War Outside My Window:
The War Outside My Window: LeRoy Wiley Gresham was born in 1847 to a prominent slave-holding family in Macon, Ga. At the age of eight, LeRoy severely injured his leg, which left him crippled. LeRoy’s mother gifted him with a blank journal so that he could record his upcoming journey to see a medical specialist in Philadelphia. LeRoy, then 12 years old, began journaling almost every day. His writings would become a primary source outlining events during the Civil War in addition to detailing personal hardships with declining health during his teen years.
The War Outside My Window is really a window looking into the thoughts and perceptions of a doomed teenager who watched the Confederacy die even as he was dying himself. Intimate, observant, thoughtful, often amusing, his diary offers a heartrending portrait of courage and resilience by a young man robbed of his youth, one personal tragedy amid the decline and collapse of the South. Pitiably few records survived to give us an understanding of the inner world of the young in the Civil War era. LeRoy Gresham’s “Window” lets in more light on the subject than any other source we have.—William C. Davis, author of “Inventing Loreta Velasquez.”
Ms. Croon graduated in 1983 from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with a Bachelor’s Degree in political Science, Modern European History, and Russian Language and Area Studies. In 1985, Ms. Croon graduated from the University of Dayton with a Master’s Degree in International Studies. For almost 20 years, Ms. Croon was an educator of International Baccalaureate History at Fairfax County Public Schools. She developed an interest in the Civil War by living in northern Virginia.
Funds generated from a purchase support the programs at Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park.