Reaching Back Through Time
It is not every day that we are granted the rare privilege of reaching back through the generations to read the personal diaries of our own family. The handwritten diaries of my great-grandfather, John Newton Prentice — a volunteer infantryman who served under President Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War — were recently discovered. My cousin, Doyle Fritz, devoted countless hours to the careful and painstaking work of transcribing the original handwriting into clear, readable text, preserving these irreplaceable firsthand accounts for our family and for future generations.
These diaries offer an intimate window into the life, thoughts, and experiences of John Newton Prentice. His legacy flows directly to us through his son, Arthur Prentice, and then to my father, Robert Leroy Prentice, who served as a Tech Sergeant in the U.S. Army during the Korean War.
On this page you will find:
Introduction — A dedicated PDF providing historical context, family background, and an overview of these remarkable documents.
The Diaries — Five separate PDF volumes, each containing the full transcription of one of the original handwritten diaries.
We invite you to explore these precious family treasures. May they bring you closer to the courage, sacrifice, and everyday humanity of an ancestor who lived through one of the most pivotal chapters in American history.