Personal Memoirs & Diaries Books

March 1st. In the morning went to my Lord's lodgings, thinking to have spoke with Mr. Sheply, having not been to visit him since my coming to town. But he being not within I went up, and out of the box where my Lord's pamphlets lay, I chose as many as I had a mind to have for my own use and left the rest. Then to my office, where little to do, abut Mr. Sheply comes to me, so at dinner time he... more...

                          DIARY OF SAMUEL PEPYS.                                 MARCH                               1663-1664 March 1st. Up and to the office, where we sat all the morning, and at noon to the 'Change, and after much business and meeting my uncle Wight, who told me how Mr. Maes had like to... more...

August 1st. Up very early, and by water to Whitehall to my Lord's, and there up to my Lord's lodging (Win. Howe being now ill of the gout at Mr. Pierce's), and there talked with him about the affairs of the Navy, and how I was now to wait today at the Privy Seal. Commissioner Pett went with me, whom I desired to make my excuse at the office for my absence this day. Hence to the Privy... more...

CHAPTER I a few words of introduction Fate has not been unkind to me. I have had my chances, particularly during the last two or three years, and—well, I have done my best to make the most of what has come my way. That and nothing more. How I came to be entrusted with the important commission of acting as Official War Office Kinematographer is an interesting story, and the first few chapters of this... more...

I OFF FOR MESOPOTAMIA It was at Taranto that we embarked for Mesopotamia. Reinforcements were sent out from England in one of two ways—either all the way round the Cape of Good Hope, or by train through France and Italy down to the desolate little seaport of Taranto, and thence by transport over to Egypt, through the Suez Canal, and on down the Red Sea to the Indian Ocean and the Persian Gulf. The... more...

AUGUST On the 30th of July, 1914, motoring north from Poitiers, we had lunched somewhere by the roadside under apple-trees on the edge of a field. Other fields stretched away on our right and left to a border of woodland and a village steeple. All around was noonday quiet, and the sober disciplined landscape which the traveller's memory is apt to evoke as distinctively French. Sometimes, even to... more...

                          DIARY OF SAMUEL PEPYS.                           AUGUST & SEPTEMBER                                 1664 August 1st. Up, my mind very light from my last night's accounts, and so up and with Sir J. Minnes, Sir W. Batten, and Sir W. Pen to St. James's, where among other things... more...

JANUARY 1664-1665 January 1st (Lord's day). Lay long in bed, having been busy late last night, then up and to my office, where upon ordering my accounts and papers with respect to my understanding my last year's gains and expense, which I find very great, as I have already set down yesterday. Now this day I am dividing my expense, to see what my clothes and every particular hath stood me in:... more...

                          DIARY OF SAMUEL PEPYS.                             MARCH & APRIL                               1664-1665 March 1st. Up, and this day being the day than: by a promise, a great while ago, made to my wife, I was to give her L20 to lay out in clothes against Easter, she did, notwithstanding... more...

CHAPTER I. FORT MOULTRIE IN 1860. The Garrison of Fort Moultrie.—Early Indications of Secession.—Situation of the Fort.—Edmund Ruffin and Robert Barnwell Rhett.—The Secretary of War.—Arms sent to the South.—Colonel Gardner.—Captain Foster ordered to Charleston Harbor.—The Officers at Fort Moultrie.—Communications with Northern Men by Cipher.—Proscription of Antislavery Men in... more...