Mary Boykin Chesnut

Mary Boykin Chesnut was a South Carolina writer whose Civil War diary recorded the political and domestic world of the Confederate elite. Married to senator and Confederate official James Chesnut Jr., she observed events from within the slaveholding ruling class.

Her revised diary combines sharp social commentary with the contradictions of a woman who criticised aspects of slavery while benefiting from it. Published long after her death, it became a major literary and historical source on the Confederacy.

Erik Larson’s The Demon of Unrest follows the crisis through Lincoln, William H. Seward, Jefferson Davis and P. G. T. Beauregard, while giving particular attention to secessionist Edmund Ruffin and diarist Mary Boykin Chesnut.