You are most assuredly correct. Its uncanny how similar the entries are for the two diaries, especially from November 10, 1862 until January 16, 1863. After that they differ quite a bit. Of course they were in the same unit (3rd MO Field Battery) and you would expect some similarities in their observations, but using the same sentence structure is very odd. What's interesting is that during the period of November 10 until January 16 Lesueur leaves camp on occasion to run various errands and during these brief periods the entries are quite different. Lesueur's descriptions of the battle of Helena and Jenkins Ferry are radically different than Waller's. Clearly something was going on between the two diarists from Nov. 10, '62 through Jan. 16, '63. Who was doing the plagiarizing is hard to determine, but I would guess Waller. Waller's diary begins several months before Lesueur's and Waller didn't join the battery until November 10. Lesueur's diary entries stop in November 1864 while Waller's continue until August 1865.

Very strange, very strange indeed. i'm glad you pointed that out.

Bill