one of them was a woman named fannie taylor dickinson. bn her diary just came to the virginia historical society just a couple of years ago and i ife don't believe it's been used inw any books like mine yet. she was the wife of a baptist minister and was one of the people who, one of the many people who had no idea that the end for their cause was coming.e so it struck her like a thunder cloud. and she began to keep a diary the day after the fire, and you really get the sense of immediacy when she writes, for example, at the very beginning e she says something like, i can't believe it was only yesterday that the yankees arrived. it seemed like forever, and youo get this immediate feeling for life under occupation, and i trr to include a lot of comments ry from just ordinary folks like her. a couple days later she said, i she wrote in her diary, last ne night i ringed the bell for ic milly. she was nowhere to be found. t in this one understated sentence, fannie dickinson captured the upheaval that the fall of richmond met, because g milly