He kept a compelling diary during the Civil War. Now the final resting place of LeRoy Wiley Gresham, who died at just 17, gets a little TLC

LeRoy Gresham; mapping of family plot (Library of Congress, Mark Newell)

Efforts to restore and clean graves at Rose Hill Cemetery – which holds the remains of slaves, three members of the Allman Brothers Band and thousands of Macon, Ga., residents – recently focused on the family plot of LeRoy Wiley Gresham, the teen boy who penned a diary that vividly captured life on the home front during the Civil War.

A small group of enthusiasts recently gave a public demonstration on proper headstone cleaning techniques at the plot, where LeRoy, his parents, two siblings and other relatives are buried.  LeRoy died  in June 1865 at just age 17.

Gresham’s diary first came to light in a 2012 Washington Post article that detailed the invalid youth’s take on the fortunes of the Confederacy. “It is a chronicle -- in neat, legible handwriting -- of the excitement of the war’s early months, the seeming endlessness of the conflict and the approach of the dreaded Yankees as they steamroll through Georgia,” the article stated.

Edmund's headstone was toppled broken

The Gresham family plot; LeRoy's grave is in center (Courtesy of Mark Newell)

The diarist’s story gained new fame in 2018 with the publication of “The War Outside My Window: The Civil War Diary of LeRoy Wiley Gresham, 1860-1865.”

Jan Croon drew on digitized copies of the diary in the collection of the Library of Congress. She spent a year conducting genealogical and property research while transcribing the diary.

LeRoy, son of John Jones Gresham and Mary Gresham, came from a prominent family. His father was an attorney, textile company founder and slave owner and served two terms as the city's mayor in the 1840s. The 1842 Inn, a Greek Revival structure that offers rooms and hosts special occasions, was built by John Gresham in 1842.

“Every time I go to Macon I have to go (to Rose Hill) and see the Greshams,” Croon told the Picket. “I have developed a huge emotional attachment to this family.”

Joey Fernandez and Odessa Walker of the Rose Hill Cemetery 1840 Facebook group led the Aug. 10 gathering on an typical hot and humid middle Georgia day.

Part of the day focused on the beginning of repairs to the broken headstone (likely from vandalism) of infant Edmund Gresham who died of pneumonia in 1846 before LeRoy was born.

Most of the other graves are in decent shape, though LeRoy’s headstone needs to be straightened.

“They needed some care. The stones had a few chips, LeRoy’s stone had a wasp’s nest growing in part of it, and dirt and things accumulate over time,” said Croon, who did not attend the event.

Among the volunteers at the public day was archaeologist Dr. Mark Newell, who said about two dozen people and a mapping service that surveyed the plot attended. 

Volunteers assisted with the cleaning of headstones.

“No unmarked burials were found at all,” said Newell, adding evidence of wooden coffins for the parents and LeRoy was recorded.

“The key thing about LeRoy’s diary is our first intimate look at the day-to-day lives of a wealthy plantation family.”

Joey Fernandez leads work day (Courtesy of Mark Newell)

The boy detailed daily life, what the family ate, the weather and what he gleaned from newspapers. “You don’t get that from the ground or archival records,” said Newell. “This is America’s Downton Abbey, when you look at the family and its wealth, and the impact of the Civil War.”

Croon has spoken to numerous groups since her book came out. She is working on a school curriculum guide and edited a young adult version of the diary.

“I knew I had something different. As the project grew, it had many more layers to it than we originally thought. It became more significant as it went. It was the only diary written by a young man who did not fight in the war who describes it in such detail. He writes almost every day. You get a sense of a community in the South that goes through a lot of change.”

Top and bottom of headstone (Courtesy of Jan Croon)

There’s been a longtime mystery regarding LeRoy’s illness. He was crippled in 1856 when a chimney collapsed and crushed his left leg. He developed other medical problems and died shortly after war’s end, from the effects of spinal tuberculosis, Croon said.

The 2012 Post article detailed some of the boy’s thoughts during the conflict. Near the end of 1862, LeRoy wrote:

“I close this record with the earnest hope that ere another Christmas is gone we may have peace and prosperity, and . . . the crisis of my disease may have passed and I may at least be released from constant confinement to a horizontal position.”

Fears that Union Maj. William Sherman might take Macon (he did not) brought this July 1864 entry:

“I went upon the top of the house but could only see the smoke. Every man in town is under arms. . . . We sit anxiously waiting for news, too excited to read or do anything but think of Father . . . and listen to the booming of the cannon. . . . A thousand wild rumors are afloat.”

Croon at book signing at Macon's Cannonball House (Courtesy of Jan Croon)

Sadly, the boy did not grow to adulthood. Worn down by illness, he succumbed less than two months after Lee's surrender at Appomattox.

While the work day brought an opportunity to spotlight the lives and deaths of the Greshams, there are many more graves at Rose Hill needing attention.

“I hope there is more awareness of not only the Greshams but the history located in all cemeteries,” said Croon.

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"It saved instant death": Bible struck by bullet during 1864 fighting is on display at Monocacy battlefield in Maryland

(Tracy Evans, Monocacy National Battlefield)

(Courtesy of Perry Adams Antiques)

A Confederate-issued Bible is on display at Monocacy National Battlefield in Maryland, where visitors can learn about the bullet that passed through it and wounded a Virginia soldier.

Pvt. Thomas Cox, a member of the Red House Volunteers, Company A, 21^st Virginia Infantry, was captured after on July 9, 1864, at the battlefield near Frederick, Md. He was fighting near the Thomas farm when he was wounded.

The 33-year-old farmer from Carroll County died on Aug. 15 at a Baltimore hospital. 

Tracy Evans, curator and park ranger at Monocacy, said this is the first time the Bible has formally been on display. The exhibit was opened in May and the volume is expected to be out for a few more months.

The small Bible is closed, but visitors can see a photograph of it when opened and read some messages that were written on its pages.

“It’s not completely falling apart but to display it open could potentially cause it to,” said Evans. “If we turn it to a certain page the binding is fragile and you don’t want to tear loose the binding.”

Bible includes handwritten notations (Courtesy of Perry Adams Antiques)

The Bible is remarkable in its own way. There’s a gaping hole in the center of the book left by the bullet. “We are thinking it must have gone in sideways,” Evans previously told the Picket, adding that is perhaps the reason Cox was not killed outright.

Cox asked a fellow prisoner at the squalid West Building’s Hospital in Baltimore to inscribe a message in his battered Bible.

“The ball that struck this book entered my left brest (sic) and came out of right – it saved instant death & will be the means of saving my soul. Thomas Cox,” reads the penciled writing on the margins of a few pages. On succeeding pages is written: “Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord.”

(Monocacy National Battlefield)

In 2015, the park purchased the New Testament for $12,500 from brokers Perry Adams Antiques in Petersburg, Va. Attempts to find a Cox descendant have been unsuccessful, Evans told the Picket.

The park said the Bible is among the few items in its collection to have known Confederate provenance.

Cox said a conservationist examined the Bible and said it was best to keep it as is.

“It is a unique item,” she said. “I think people are interested in it because it has entries in it.”

Recovered Enfield rifle stocks are holding up well, but crate and protective metal lining are showing more signs of deterioration

Enfield rifles are surrounded by a metal lining (Sweetwater Creek State Park)

A crate of 20 British-made Enfield rifles that never made it into the hands of Confederate soldiers has remained in water ever since it was pulled from the wreckage of the blockade runner CSS Stono in the late 1980s.

For the last six years, the weapons have been on display in a 300-gallon aquarium at Sweetwater Creek State Park west of Atlanta. Every six months or so, technicians with the Historic Preservation Division of the Georgia Department of Natural Resources clean the tank and check on the status of the artifacts.

“The rifles themselves are in great shape, as far as the wood goes. That’s kind of a mystery,” said Josh Headlee, a curator and historic preservation specialist.

The remnants of the wooden crate and metal lining have not fared so well.

While the rifle stocks are walnut, the crate is likely pine, a softer wood, said Headlee. And the metal lining, made of an alloy, appears to be waterlogged.

The tank was recently cleaned (Georgia Dept. of Natural Resources)

“The metal is taking on properties of cloth, becoming really soft,” he said. The rifles are bulging that metal outward.

Headlee and another specialist recently cleared the tank algae and loose reddish sediment. “I run my hand over (the rifles) and that removes the stubborn algae.”

Pending conservation of the artifacts, technicians have worked over the past several years to remove damaging salt (chloride).

“We are actually right at tap water,” said Headlee. “We feel most of the salts have already leached out.”

The CSS Stono, laden with precious arms, munitions and goods from Europe, in 1863 ran aground on a submerged sandbar off Fort Moultrie while trying to evade Federal ships.

Wooden crate (front) has softened over the years (Sweetwater Creek State Park)

“It looks like this crate had fallen off a stack and one end had busted completely out,” said Headlee. “A couple of the rifles were damaged. Because the crate was damaged all the sediment had washed in it and basically turned to concrete.”

After Georgia acquired the guns from South Carolina, technicians chipped off the encrusted material.

Other crates containing the highly prized Pattern 53 rifles are still lying in Charleston Harbor.

At least one of the weapons bears the mark, “T. Turner,” a reference to well-known English gunmaker Thomas Turner, who turned out quality weapons in the mid-19th century.

The iron rifle barrels, locks and bayonets in the crate are heavily deteriorated from saltwater corrosion. Brass components, including butt plates, trigger guards and the nose cap at the end of the barrels, better withstood the ravages of longtime submersion. Researchers also found a bullet mold, tools and tampions, or cork and brass plugs inserted into the muzzle to ward off moisture. Those items are not in the aquarium.

The metal lining sealed the cargo from salt air and ensured the rifles were not tampered with. Inside, the rifles were placed in an alternating butt to muzzle pattern. Wooden blocks were used to prevent the weapons from shifting.

The artifacts have been in a “holding pattern” until money is secured for conservation.

The 3,000-gallon tank after recent cleaning (Sweetwater Creek State Park)

In the short term, Headlee may look at a fungicide as a way to cut down on algae.

“I would love something more done with them,” he says of the rifles, crate and lining.

Officials are looking into a possible heritage grant to do extensive conservation that will take the artifacts out of the water. For now, the items remain in a protective water environment. 

But even that can’t prevent degradation.

“We are doing everything we can do to slow it down,” said Headlee. “I am noticing it is picking up.”