My grandmother the other day whipped out this book she claims was written and printed in the civil war. I haven't removed the cloth to see the name of the book, but here, here and here are the first few pages. It's neat that she has a book that's so old, but I'd like to learn more about it (like who wrote it or how popular was it) and some of the things we found in the pages for her.
These two bills were found in the book. One I can tell is a confederate ten dollar bill. The other uses Cyrillic characters, but I have no idea what it is. Here is a picture of the backs to either confirm or dis-confirm their authenticity maybe.
I don't know what this is, but I found it in there too. As far as I know it could be over a hundred years old or made yesterday. It looks like a tag for a shirt so I really am not expecting anything.
This seems to be a map of a local river. I don't know how to read it or for what purpose it was used. Any information would be interesting! Here is where the river is located in Tennessee.
Finally, on the back of the pages with pictures there were several handwritten notes. These are only a few, but there were several more.
I can't read cursive, but if you can is there anything interesting there? I can make out some dates.
This may not be as interesting a find as I think. I was excited to see she had a book so old with old currencies in them and other cool things, so I wanted to find out more information. All she knows is her aunt gave it to her years ago and told her simply it was from the civil war. I have no plans to sell this and want to keep it for a long time, but are they worth anything? It makes little difference to me, but I would make an effort to preserve them better if they were rare.
edit: spelling
I went ahead and had a go at the first of the handwritten notes. Some of it is pretty hard to read, especially the part in pink and the names. Here is what I could read. I've added question marks to indicate that I'm not sure about what it says "(?)", and where I can't read what it says "?". I've also left in the original spelling errors.
J.W., Thopson (?) J.B., ? This?
I firmley believe by expirance as a gard at Libby Prison at Richmond va. That all This Book contains is fact in regard to the treatment of Union prisners.
Lewis ? of ? of the 36 Va Regimental army of the valley of va.
The map looks like a tax map, something you would find in the possession of the County Clerk, giving a rough location of various parcels and how big they are, so they can be assessed. Some of the smaller plots look like subdivisions for houses, so it might be a crossroads community. Since there's a railroad at one end and the Duck at the other, you might be able to whittle down which county working with Google Maps or the old USGS topo maps. It says something like " land near [Cou]traville". There's a Coulterville but that's southeast TN. Centerville TN is on the Duck, though.
Looked a moment, might be those plots on Rt 50 between Atys Way and Broome Ln.
The Duck is a pleasant river to float in a canoe.
I'm curious, how many other pages of handwritten notes were there? Any chance you will upload more?
