Came across this in a web search:

From the Macon Telegraph, October 6, 2008:

Fort Valley children learn about Civil War through imprisoned soldier's diary
By Jake Jacobs - jjacobs@macon.com

The words of Confederate soldier William E. Killen spanned 144 years Friday to captivate fifth-grade students at Hunt Elementary School.

Honors students in Jane Stump's class are wrapping up a unit about the Civil War, and she invited her father, retired Methodist minister Jason Shirah of Savannah, to read from his great-grandfather's Civil War diary.

Killen was a farmer in Houston County and was a Confederate soldier.

"They supported slavery," Shirah told the class of mostly black students. While he didn't say if Killen was a slaveholder or not, Shirah did say his ancestor thought being in the army was what he was supposed to do.

"I've thought about him, what he thought and believed, how he would feel if he were alive today," Shirah said. "I loved him, and I accept him for his character."

According to a Web site, William E. Killen of Houston County enlisted in the Confederate Army on March 4, 1862. Shirah said Killen was in the Army of Northern Virginia, led by the legendary Gen. Robert E. Lee.

In the summer of 1863, Lee's forces clashed for three days with those of Union Gen. George Meade at Gettysburg, Pa. The battle has been regarded as the turning point of the Civil War.

Killen was wounded and taken prisoner by Union soldiers. He was transported to Ohio, to a prisoner-of-war camp on Johnson's Island off Sandusky Bay on Lake Erie, along with about 2,000 other Confederates. Shirah said he doesn't know how he did it, but Killen managed to obtain a diary, along with a quill pen and ink. The first entry was dated Jan. 1, 1864: "Johnson's Island, Ohio. The temperature is 6 degrees below zero."

"Can you imagine Lake Erie being frozen over?" Shirah asked the students. "They had one stove in a large area for 20 men. But he was uncomplaining. He was amazingly accepting of conditions."

Killen began every entry with a record of the weather, Shirah said.

Jan. 25: "Rain and warm for the season. Had the Southern mail today. No mail for me."

Jan. 26: "Fair and warm. No news today. I fear that my loved ones are ill. God protect us. God protect us."

Jan. 29: "Cloudy and quite warm, a chance of rain. Hoping all is well at home."

Feb. 5: "Cloudy and light snow. Boats over from Sandusky."

March 14: "Cloudy and disagreeable with more snow. There is constant talk of a prisoner exchange. Oh, what an awful life this prison life is."

Shirah said Killen was not exchanged for a Union prisoner. He hoped for an exchange as his way to go back home.

"Many entries are the same like that, with little differences except for the weather," Shirah said. "But he wanted a record of his imprisonment."

Nov. 8: It was Election Day in the North, Shirah said. "Cloudy with a great deal of rain. I think Lincoln will be elected by a large majority."

Shirah said Killen managed fairly well until his weakened condition as a result of prison life and bad weather worked against him that December.

"He slipped on some ice on some steps, fell and injured his head," Shirah said. "A friend recorded this: 'Lt. William E. Killen, Block 12, received a severe wound and on Tuesday, Dec. 13, 1864, he died." He was buried there.

"And now is the mystery of mysteries," Shirah said. "His friend wrote this in the front of the book: 'If this is lost, please send to Mrs. William E. Killen, Henderson, Houston County, Georgia.' And it arrived to her in the mail. How it survived we'll never know."

The diary was passed from Killen's widow to her daughter, then on to her daughter, who was Shirah's mother. He now keeps it in a safe deposit box in a bank, he said. "It's one of my valuables."

Shirah said he feels a connection with the past each time he handles the diary.

"I'm touching what he touched, reading what he wrote," Shirah said. "There is a sense of kinship with his character."

A visit to the prison at Andersonville some years ago brought Shirah news he had been looking for. He said he told a staffer at the park where his great-grandfather had been a prisoner, and wondered whether there was a record of any sort for the cemetery at Johnson's Island.

The staffer came back with a book and there was an entry for No. 106, William E. Killen.

"They catalogued it, and I made up my mind to go there," Shirah said.

The opportunity came in 1989, when Shirah, his wife and her sister visited Cleveland. They went to the old prison site, now a park similar to Andersonville. The original wooden markers of 1864 had been replaced by granite markers in the 1890s, he said.

"We each took a row and looked for Marker 106," he said. "I came upon it, and I give you my word, I just crumpled on it. I said, 'You've waited a long time for someone in the family to come here.' "

The classroom was reverently silent.

"This is the first time I've seen children more interested in what was said than the food," said Stump, who had some refreshments on a table for the class and their visitors.

"What good listeners," Shirah agreed. "I was a Methodist minister for 43 years and never had a congregation listen to a sermon so well."

He wrapped up his visit by encouraging the young students to start keeping a diary.

Kaylen King, 10, said she thought it was good to learn new things from the past.

"If I keep a diary now, in the future people will know how things are today," she said.

To contact writer Jake Jacobs, call 923-6199, extension 305.

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There was a photograph with the following caption: The Telegraph - Retired Methodist minister Jason Shirah talks about his great-grandfather William E. Killen to honors students in Jane Stump's class at Hunt Elementary School in Fort Valley. Shirah, who shared Killen's Civil War-era diary with the class, is Stump's father.

Sounds like someone you'd like to contact!

G. W. Martin