My Silent Friend: A Church Hill Journal

2017-08-06T15:59:48-04:00

Price: 39.50

1882-1884 Richmond [Virginia] Diary of Mary Pollard Darracott Herring

At the time she began keeping this journal, Mary was 62 years old and was living with her husband, George, age 61, and four daughters, Sue, age 19, Fannie, 24, Carrie, 25, and Mary (Mollie), 32. Their fifth daughter, Nannie, had died in May 1882. George was a grocer and a liquor broker. They lived in the Church Hill area of Richmond, among neighbors who "though not wealthy, were eminently substantial." Mary died in Richmond in 1903. Mr. Winston has painstakingly transcribed Mary Herring's diary, adding explanatory notes, identifying neighbors, relatives and places, elucidating events, and documenting the whole. He has presented to the reader a time long gone - and preserved close family life and values as they are seldom seen today. One is made humbly aware of the dependence upon God's will in Mary's forbearance in adversity. It is of interest to note the advances in conveniences in the home, in medicine, travel, and communication. Not only is My Silent Friend an account of a family, but also of their neighbors and their city; a way of life in Richmond gone by. Had Mary Pollard Darracott Herring not been so handicapped with her hearing loss, she may never have kept such an extensive conversation with her 'silent friend.' It is a diary to be read and enjoyed, and in which to find one's own family heritage." Edited by her great-grandson, Alfred Sumner Winston, III.

Mary Pollard Darracott Herring; Alfred Sumner Winston, III, editor

2003, 6" x 9", paper, index, 447 pp.

ISBN: 9781585498536

101-W0853