Byrd, the ancestor of retired Senator Harry F. Byrd, Jr., from Virginia and of Admiral Richard E. Byrd, writes of his daily life, his relations with the Indians, the treatment of his slaves, his sexual and emotional life and the growth of his community. Since the diary was in cipher, like Pepys, Byrd felt free to put down all the thoughts in his heart and what emerges is so pungent and characteristic, and yet so human, that one is tempted to add, so American, that by the time we have read three pages of his diary entries we know not only the great William Byrd, but also early and modern America.

This Colonel William Byrd was the son of William Byrd, II, who had established the family fortunes in the Colony of Virginia as an Indian Trader and Planter. When William II was seven he was sent to relatives in England to be educated and was duly enrolled in Felsted Grammar School in Essex. Later he became a member of Middle Temple and for a time went to Holland to learn business practices. When his father died in 1704 William inherited a substantial fortune and took his place as one of the leading members of the Virginia Aristocracy. Few men of his time in Virginia had greater responsibilities and honors.

As a youth he was elected to the House of Burgesses and later became a member of the all important Council of State of which he was president in the last year of his life. On several occasions he went to London to act as Agent for the Colony. At various times he served his Country as Colonel of the Militia and in other capacities. Early in his career he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society and until the end of his life took pride in being a member of that learned and august body.

One of his most interesting duties was that of leader of the surveying party which in 1728 established the boundary between Virginia and North Carolina. That experience led to Byrd's writing "The History of the Dividing Line Between Virginia and North Carolina in the Year of our Lord 1728", a work which circulated in manuscript in Byrd's own lifetime and was published in 1841. This document gave Byrd a reputation as one of the most urbane of Southern writers in the Colonial Period. He also wrote two or three other shorter pieces including "A Journey to the Land of Eden" and "A Progress to the Mines".

Byrd became known as a diarist when the first section of his secret shorthand diary turned up in the Huntingdon Library and was edited by Louis B. Writhe and Marion Tinling as "The Secret Diary of William Byrd. Westover 1709-1712." — Other portions of the diary at the University of North Carolina, transcribed by Mr. Tinling and edited by Mrs. Tinling and Miss Woodfin as another "Secret Diary of William Byrd, Westover 1739-1741" with letters and literary exercises 1696-1726. A third portion was discovered in the Virginia Historical Society and was edited by Louis B. Wright and Marion Tinling as "William Byrd of Virginia, The London Diary 1717-1721". All three volumes are still in print. At the time Byrd was keeping the third section of the diary he was married to Lucy Parke, the spoiled daughter of Colonel Daniel Parke. They quarreled with vehemence and their life together was tempestuous. The diary mentions frequently both moments of intimate tenderness and violent bursts of anger. Byrd complacently asserts that in all their quarrels he was in the right and she was in the wrong. He remarks on his efficacy as his wife's lover (at the time Lucy must have found him hard to endure).

He was extraordinary hard working whether among plantation affairs, the affairs of the Colony or the training of his mind. Despite temptation of the flesh to which he often succumbed he was very pious and consistent reader of the Sermons of the Rev. John Tillotson or some other popular preacher whose works were in print. He read selections from Greek, Hebrew, or Latin. Nearly every entry in the diary closes with the formula: "I said my prayers, I had good health, good thoughts and good humor, thanks to God Almighty".

Colonel Byrd returned to London 1717 to 1721 where he served as Agent for the Colony, a diplomatic post that required him to know everyone who mattered in the government, such as Members of the Board of Trade, which dealt with Colonial affairs. Frequenting coffee houses, the Spanish Ambassador (who seems to have run of the more elaborate gambling resorts), Byrd lost more than he won. He attended countless balls and other social affairs, went to horse races and took the waters Turnbridge Wells. By this time he was a widower. Lucy Parke had contracted smallpox and died in London. Upon his return to Westover, he continued to be an American Leader.