From a Yankee to a Rebel Diary: The Collective Civil War Diaries of Private George Washington Hall, 14th Georgia Infantry, and Private Jacob L. Elsesser, 9th Pennsylvania Reserves

From a Yankee to a Rebel Diary stands out among Civil War diaries as a unique "blue-gray" manuscript that captures the voices of two privates in opposing armies who chronicled their wartime experiences in the same small volume - a Daily Remembrancer for 1862.Private Jacob Elsesser of the 9th Pennsylvania Reserves wrote almost six months of entries in his Daily Remembrancer before abandoning the book in the aftermath of fighting at Beaver Dam Creek near Richmond, Virginia, in June 1862. Private George Washington Hall of the 14th Georgia Infantry found the Daily Remembrancer as he marched with his regiment through Elsesser’s former campsite. Hall picked up Elsesser’s book and wrote inside that he was turning it from a Yankee to a Rebel diary. Hall wrote continuously in the Daily Remembrancer until late March 1865. His entries recount a profound religious conversion and describe how his faith helped him survive combat, illness, and nine harrowing months as a prisoner of war in the Union prison at Fort Delaware.Mary Hall, George Washington Hall’s great-granddaughter, not only edited the unique dual diary but also provides meticulously researched context material that highlights the intertwined lives of the two men. In addition to hundreds of diary entries, her manuscript also features narratives, song lyrics, and poems from a small journal that George Washington Hall kept between 1862-1863 and a unit history drafted by Jacob Elsesser and preserved by his descendants. Collectively, these robust sources offer a rare dual perspective on the hardship and humanity of the Civil War. They vividly portray the brutality of combat in the Eastern Theater’s fiercest battles, the drudgery of camp life, and the bittersweet longing for home. This compelling collection not only contrasts the experiences of two privates from opposite armies but also reveals how their shared sense of duty shaped their post-war lives: Elsesser returned to elected office as a justice of the peace in Pennsylvania, and Hall - honoring a wartime pledge to spend his life spreading God’s word - became a Baptist preacher and missionary in Florida. Their contemporaneous writings during the Civil War remain part of their legacies, bridging the years to offer timeless insight into the human dimensions of America’s most defining conflict. Read more