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  • Refugitta of Richmond: The Wartime Recollections, Grave and Gay, of Constance Cary Harrison
  • Jennifer Newman Trevino
Refugitta of Richmond: The Wartime Recollections, Grave and Gay, of Constance Cary Harrison. Eds. Nathaniel Cheairs Hughes Jr. and S. Kittrell Rushing. Knoxville: The University of Tennessee Press, 2011. ISBN 978-1-57233-747-3, 272 pp., cloth, $37.00.

Memoirs offer a unique perspective on the Civil War and its impact on Americans. During the war hundreds of individuals kept diaries. Afterward, many Americans revisited their experiences and turned their diaries into published memoirs. These accounts benefitted from hindsight, and subsequent events often influenced them. This is especially true of memoirs written by southerners seeking to justify their actions and defend the Lost Cause.

Based on her wartime diary, correspondence, and records of other participants, the memoir of Constance Cary Harrison reveals the wartime experiences of a white, privileged, southern woman. The life of Constance Cary Harrison, who was born in 1843 to an elite Virginia family, spanned the antebellum era, the Civil [End Page 287] War, Reconstruction, and the early twentieth century. She became a prolific writer long before the publication of her memoir. During the winter of 1861, at the age of eighteen, Constance Cary arrived with other family members as a refugee in the capital of the Confederacy, Richmond, Virginia. The next few years proved full of struggles, intrigue, excitement, and despair. Cary and her family were devoted to the war effort, but they also enjoyed the social life of Richmond. In the winter of 1862, she met her future husband, Burton Norvell Harrison, the private secretary to the Confederate President, Jefferson Davis, during the war. Her family connections and friendship with Burton allowed her access to the highest social circles in Richmond, including the Davis family. She and her future husband witnessed significant historic events; toward the end of the war, for example, she was at church with Davis when he received word that Richmond would soon fall to Union forces, and her future husband witnessed Davis's capture.

Originally published in 1911, the memoir has since been available as a reprint and as an electronic document on the University of North Carolina's Documenting the American South website (http://docsouth.unc.edu). Nonetheless, this memoir has been often overlooked, as Nathaniel Cheairs Hughes Jr. and S. Kittrell Rushing note in their edition, Refugitta of Richmond: The Wartime Recollections, Grave and Gay, of Constance Cary Harrison, published in 2011. This new edition differs from the previous ones in several ways. The editors focus exclusively on the wartime years of the memoir and provide a wealth of information that situates it within its historical context. They left the text in its original form but correct its historical inaccuracies in the footnotes. Their argument for publishing this new volume is that "Harrison's memories of the war are too valuable, too well expressed, and too important to remain in history's closet" (x). This assertion is amply justified. The book would have benefitted from a more in-depth discussion of memory and its influence on Constance's memoir. This aside, the book is excellent and provides a wealth of information on far more than just the life of a southern woman during the war. It offers insight on various aspects of Richmond's wartime culture, society, and politics, among other things. Numerous subplots run throughout the narrative, as Constance naturally included information on her family members. Other than her future husband, one of the most notable individuals was her cousin, Hetty Cary, who was forced to flee Baltimore, Maryland after taunting Union troops with a Confederate flag. It also gives a glimpse of the Union capital, Washington, D.C., as Constance and Hetty made their way through Union lines to the capital in order to take care of some investments they had at a bank in the city. The editors of this volume [End Page 288] offer an excellent evaluation of the memoir when they wrote that "Recollections Grave and Gay is indeed an adventure story, a romance, and a firsthand view of the Confederate nerve center from a unique vantage point" (xviii).

Jennifer Newman Trevino
Troy University, Montgomery...

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