The serene setting was bustling with activity and anticipation as the C-SPAN production crew made final preparations for the network`s series ``American Writers: A Journey Through History,`` which focuses this week on Camden`s Mary Boykin Chesnut and her Civil War journals.

It took the C-SPAN production crew most of Sunday afternoon and several more hours early Monday morning to set up their equipment for the live broadcast from Mulberry Plantation Monday. The broadcast began about 9:10 a.m. and ended about 11:45 a.m. In all, some 15 people were involved in the airing of the live broadcast.

Technical crew members put their numerous cameras, lights, sound equipment and monitors in just the right places. Opaque and sheer fabric screens were used to control natural light on two sets -- one on the white columned veranda and another on the grounds beneath a white tent.

The yellow C-SPAN bus, a mobile television studio, stood on the grounds as a sort of ``green room`` for broadcast guests and a viewing room for a few others, including South Carolina First Lady Rachel Hodges, and members of the family that owns Mulberry Plantation: Jack and Martha Daniels and Isabel and Katherine Hill.

On-air host for the program was Susan Swain, longtime moderator of ``Washington Journal.`` Swain is vice president and co-chief operating officer of C-SPAN.

The three guests who answered her questions and handled the comments of call-in viewers were Dr. Elisabeth Muhlenfeld, president of Sweetbriar College and author of ``Mary Boykin Chesnut: A Biography``; Dr. Bernard Powers, professor of history at the College of Charleston and author of ``Black Charlestonians: A Social History 1822-1885``; and Dr. Walter Edgar, professor of Southern studies at the University of South Carolina and author of ``South Carolina: A History.``

Each of the panelists, as the titles of their respective books imply, brought a different perspective to the discussion. While their opinions varied at times, all three panelists were most knowledgeable, personable and seemingly at home in front of the camera -- even when addressing controversial comments from call-in viewers. During the show, viewers called from more than 20 states -- from New York to Oregon, from Texas to Illinois, from Iowa to California.

The mission of C-SPAN is to allow a forum for a wide diversity of opinions -- and that`s what the broadcast got. There`s nothing like the Civil War and the system of slavery to spark controversy.

However, many of the callers apparently had read and were intrigued with the journals, which have been published in various forms -- in 1905 as ``A Diary from Dixie`` and in 1981 as ``Mary Chesnut`s Civil War,`` among others. Many wanted to ask questions about the author`s life and some of the colorful characters who travel the pages of her journals.

As the wife of James Chesnut Jr., a United States senator -- who resigned his seat and became a Confederate general and aide to Confederate President Jefferson Davis -- Mary Chesnut had an inside view of the political and social scene. Though she supported the Confederacy, she called slavery ``a monstrous system.`` She also deplored the subservient status of women at the time.

Muhlenfeld, as a graduate student at the University of South Carolina, worked with C. Vann Woodard, who edited the journals as ``Mary Chesnut`s Civil War`` and won a Pulitzer Prize in 1982 for his efforts. She called the compiled journals ``the most important book about the Civil War.``

As an English major, Muhlenfeld saw the journals as a literary work, not just a historical one. In a conversation Saturday, Muhenfeld said Mary Chesnut jotted down things hurriedly in her diary. Then after the war, she went back over them, first to be sure the subjects and verbs agreed. But then, without changing the facts or her feelings, she began to add more descriptions, bringing the characters to life.

On the broadcast, Muhlenfeld said that Mary Chesnut still had not completed the revisions of her journals when she died in 1886 at the age of 63. She had entrusted 50 notebooks of the revised diary, as well as the originals, to her friend Isabella Martin, who stored them under an armoire in her bedroom. There was reluctance to publish them because of the author`s ``irreverent comments about people who were still alive.`` So, only about half of the work was published initially.

During the program, actress Chris Weatherhead was interviewed, and a clip from her new one-woman show: ``Mary Chesnut`s War for Independence,`` taped Saturday afternoon at the Fine Arts Center of Kershaw County, was broadcast.

Additionally, Isabel Hill, great-great-great-niece of Mary Chesnut, was featured on the show. Though Mary Chesnut had no children of her own, there are numerous descendants from her siblings and from the Chesnut family. Mulberry Plantation has remained in the same family, descended from Col. John Chesnut, for 240 years. The present house was built in 1820 by Col. James Chesnut, father of James Chesnut Jr.

Hill is a descendant of the Williams family, one of the families in a corporation, also including families with the surnames Daniels and Tabor, that still owns Mulberry.

Hill was asked about the condition of Mulberry after the Civil War and related that the house had been sacked and the animals had been slaughtered by Union soldiers.

Hill recalled some of her literary ancestor`s beliefs: ``She felt very strongly that women should have more power.``

Another guest on the show was Charles ``Chuck`` Lesser of the South Carolina Department of Archives and History. He presented a lithographic facsimile of the ordinance of succession, which was signed by, among others, James Chesnut Jr.

Footage of downtown Camden and of Mary Chesnut`s childhood home in Stateburg (previously called Statesburg) were used during the live broadcast. Shots of Wesley Chapel United Methodist Church on the Sumter Highway, a black church, where Mary Chesnut sometimes attended services, was also included in the broadcast.

However, only Sarsfield of the three homes connected to the Chesnuts and videotaped May 22 by series producer Mark Farkas and production manager Eric Hansen were shown on the live broadcast. Farkas said there`s a possibility but no guarantee that some of that footage may be edited into the rebroadcast at 8 p.m. Friday. The other two homes filmed were Kamschatka, which Mary and James Chesnut built before they moved to Washington, D.C., when he became a senator, and Bloomsbury, the home of his sister, Sally, where they often stayed.

Other segments previously filmed in Charleston, Camden and Columbia related to Mary Chesnut or her work may also be aired after the rebroadcast Friday night. Those interested in seeing them may want to set their VCRs since the programs could go on into the wee hours.

There may also be airings of some of the additional segments during the week, probably during the evenings, said Meghan Stalebrink, C-SPAN community relations representative. Funded primarily by the cable industry, C-SPAN (Cable Satellite Public Affairs Network) is a non-profit network. The commercial-free network doesn`t publish schedules of its programs, other than its major series, like ``American Writers,`` because its major function is to cover the U.S. House of Representatives. Happenings there can pre-empt any other programing. ``We`re at the mercy of Congress,`` Stalebrink said.

C-SPAN`s affiliate here, Charter Communications, airs over cable channel 38.