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Caroline Richards started her journal in 1852 when she was 10. She lived in Canandaigua, only a short drive from Livonia! She tells about her school, town, and clothing, and about the Women's Rights movement . She even heard Susan B. Anthony speak! She was the president of the Young Ladies' Aid Society, which sewed clothes for Civil War  soldiers. After the War, she helped raise money for freed slaves.
 * Background: **

I am ten years old today, and I think I will write a journal and tell who I am and what I am doing. I have lived with my Grandfather and Grandmother Beals ever since I Was seven years old, and Anna, too, since she was four. Our brothers, James and John, came too, but they are at the East Bloomfield Academy. Anna and I go to school at District No. 11. Mr. James Cross is our teacher, and some of the scholars say he is cross by name and cross by nature, but I like him. He gave me a book for reward of merit in my reading class. I think I shall write a book some day.
 * BEFORE THE WAR **
 * ENTRY ONE **
 * //November 21, 1852 //**

Grandfather took us to ride this afternoon and let us ask Bessie to go with us. We road on the plank road to Chapinville and had to pay 2 cents at the toll gate. We met a good many people and Grandfather bowed to them and said, "How do you do, neighbor?" ... We went to see Mr. Munson, who runs the mill. He took us through the mill and let us get weighed and took us over to his house and out into the barn-yard to see the pigs and chickens and we also saw a colt which was one day old.
 * ENTRY TWO **
 * //November 1852 //**

Susan B. Anthony is in town and spoke in Bemis Hall this afternoon. She had a large audience and she talked very plainly about our rights and how we ought to stand up for them, and said the world would never go right until the women had just as much right to vote and rule as the men. She asked us all to come up and sign our names who would promise to do all in our power to bring about that glad day when equal rights should be the law of the land. A whole lot went up and signed the paper.
 * ENTRY THREE **
 * December 20, 1855 **

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The storm has broken upon us. The Confederates fired on Fort Sumter, just off the coast of South Carolina, and forced her on April 14 to haul down the flag and surrender. President Lincoln has issued a call for 75,000 men and many are volunteering to go all around us. How strange and awful it seems.
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">THE CIVIL WAR **
 * <span style="color: #ee600c; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">ENTRY FOUR **
 * //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">April 15, 1861 //**

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Many of the young men are going from Canandaigua and all the neighboring towns. It seems very patriotic and grand when they are singing, “It is sweet, Oh, ’tis sweet, for one’s country to die,” and we hear the martial music and see the flags flying and see the recruiting tents on the square and meet men in uniform at every turn and see train loads of the boys in blue going to the front, but it will not seem so grand if we hear they are dead on the battlefield, far from home.
 * //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">May, 1861 //**

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">A lot of us girls went down to the train and took flowers to the soldiers as they were passing through and they cut buttons from their coats and gave to us as souvenirs. We wear little flag pins for badges and tie our hair with red, white and blue ribbon and have pins and earrings made of the buttons the soldiers gave us.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The news came this morning that our dear president, Abraham Lincoln, was assassinated yesterday... I have felt sick over it all day and so has every one that I have seen. All seem to feel as though they had lost a personal friend, and tears flow plenteously. How soon has sorrow followed upon the heels of joy! One week ago to-night we were celebrating our victories with loud acclamations of mirth and good cheer. Now every one is silent and sad and the earth and heavens seem clothed in sack-cloth. The bells have been tolling this afternoon. The flags are all at half mast, draped with mourning, and on every store and dwelling-house some sign of the nation’s loss is visible. Just after breakfast this morning, I looked out of the window and saw a group of men listening to the reading of a morning paper, and I feared from their silent, motionless interest that something dreadful had happened, but I was not prepared to hear of the cowardly murder of our President.
 * <span style="color: #ee600c; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">ENTRY FIVE **
 * //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">April 15, 1865 //**

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Civil War Women <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">[|Caroline's Diary Online]
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">More about Caroline Cowles Richards **