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NOTICE: The copyright law of the United States (Title 17, United States Code) governs the making of reproductions of copyrighted material. One specified condition is that the reproduction is not to be "used for any purpose other than private study, scholarship, or research." If a user makes a request for, or later uses a reproduction for purposes in excess of "fair use," that user may be liable for copyright infringement. RESTRICTIONS: This student work may be read, quoted from, cited, for purposes of research. It may not be published in full except by permission of the author. “EVERY WOMAN WAS TO SOME EXTENT A POLITICIAN” ELITE VIRGINIAN WOMEN FROM THE ANTEBELLUM PERIOD THROUGH RECONSTRUCTION Rebecca Reed American Studies – Departmental Honors Reed 2 INTRODUCTION Throughout the American Civil War, Sallie Brock Putnam dwelled in Richmond, Virginia, and diligently documented the events and the repercussions of the war occurring around her. Writing of the first year of the war, in 1861, Putnam records, “It was at this period that the women of Virginia, and especially of Richmond, began to play the important part in public affairs, which they sustained with unflinching energy during four years of sanguinary and devastating war… Every women was to some extent a politician.”1 Putnam’s acknowledgement of female participation in politics highlights the important role that women played in the American Civil War, but she understates their involvement prior to the war and the duration of their activity after the war. Like many other ladies of Virginia, Putnam’s involvement in the Civil War demonstrated the important role that women fulfilled in the years leading up to the war and continued to satisfy long after the South surrendered to the North. Virginia, for both political and geographical reasons, is a particularly interesting location to explore how females involved themselves and shaped the political sphere in the Civil War era. Since the colonial period, Virginia played an important role in the politics of North America; in many cases, other colonies, and later states, looked to Virginia for leadership and guidance.2 During the Civil War, this was no different. In the months leading up to the breakout of fighting, both the Northern and the Southern states watched Virginia, anxious to see which “side” of the conflict they would choose to support. The politics of Virginia was also closely related to its geography. Historians often view Virginia as the border between the North and the South, and 1 Sallie B. Putnam, Richmond During the War: Four Years of Personal Observation by a Richmond Lady (New York, NY: G.W. Carleton & Co. Publishers, 1867), 4. 2 Ulrich Bonnell Phillips, The Course of the South to Secession, ed. E. Merton Coulter (New York, NY: D. Appleton-Century Company, 1939), 60-82. Reed 3 for this reason also reflects political characteristics from both regions. Consequently, understanding the political movements of Virginian females illustrates influences from both the North and the South as well.3 Female political involvement started long before the outbreak of the Civil War. Since the beginning of the republic, women found ways to influence the men around them and to play a meaningful role in the dawn of the new nation. As the nineteenth century matured, females found ways to play a more public position in the politics of the nation, even though some would classify these methods of participation as non-traditional. Nevertheless, these unique methods of breaking into the political sphere helped Virginian women find a particular and substantial place for themselves. However, a majority of the women who were immersed in Virginian politics belonged to the upper class of society, which reflects the class stratification of women during this era.4 Elite women, through illustrious bloodlines and prominent marriages, arguably possessed a greater power as political entities than their poorer white sisters; they were educated, socialized, and most importantly, had a certain amount of clout which allowed for an easier entry into the political realm. Only white women were able to fulfill this responsibility; minority women were completely excluded from the political sphere. Although Virginian women fulfilled political roles long before the outbreak of the war, the impending sectional conflict created opportunities for their increased presence in the political domain. Throughout the initial years of the war, they flourished in their roles as domestic 3 Phillips, The Course of the South to Secession, 160-165; 4 See Elizabeth Varon, We Mean to Be Counted: White Women and Politics in Antebellum Virginia (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1998); Paula Baker, “The Domestication of Politics: Women and the American Political Society,” The American Historical Review, Vol. 89, no. 3 (June 1984): 620-647. Reed 4 politicians, and fostered great support for the war effort in their home state of Virginia.5 They did so through acts that were inherently domestic, but became political in the face of the war, such as nursing, sewing battle flags, and raising money to support their troops. For some women, however, most notably elite women, the end of the war saw a decrease in their dedication to the Confederacy; through similar political means, they fought to undermine the Confederate political cause in hopes of ending the war to regain their roles as successful caregivers and mothers since the Confederate government did not provide for them in the ways promised.6 Following the end of the war, these same women fought for room in the political sphere in hopes of memorializing the Confederacy that they initially supported wholeheartedly, despite their faltering dedication to the cause in the final months of the war. Through memorialization, these women again asserted their political natures and their ability to influence the public sphere through seemingly domestic tasks. Because memorialization was inherently a political act, Southern males, who realized the power that females held in this movement, noticed their role in Southern memory. Much like their actions at the end of the war, these movements were important for the women to act as caregivers when they noticed a void in the services provided by the Confederate government. Historians frequently consider the role of Southern women in society and the ways they shared their influence both inside and outside the home. Historians such as Catherine Clinton and Elizabeth Fox Genovese consider the role of the antebellum women, and how they were able to transform their identities through both the duties as wife and mother, as well as mistress to the 5 See Catherine W. Bishir, “’A Strong Force of Ladies’: Women, Politics, and Confederate Memorial Associations in Nineteenth-Century Raleigh” The North Carolina Historical Review Vol. 77, No. 4 (October 2000), 455-491; Stephanie McCurry, Confederate Reckoning: Power and Politics in the Civil War South (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2010). 6 See Stephanie McCurry, Confederate Reckoning; Drew Gilpin Faust, Mothers of Invention: Women of the Slaveholding South in the American Civil War (Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press, 1996). Reed 5 slaves owned by the family.7 This scholarship, although transformative for understanding the importance of women in this region throughout the antebellum period, can provide even more insight into the lives of Southern women when applied to the larger scope of the Civil War and the postbellum period throughout Virginia. Historians who have taken a broader approach, such as Stephanie McCurry, elaborate on the scholarly work of both Genovese and Clinton, but have not extrapolated the workings of Confederate women throughout the Civil War into the beginning stages of Reconstruction. Applying scholarly research in such a way is extremely important, for it is able to explain trends through a changing society. Although McCurry’s study is instrumental for the trajectory of this study, she mainly focuses on the roles of soldier’s wives, and their participation in public actions, whereas the focus of this project is more geared toward elite women and their surplus of political determination and potential.8 This honors project utilizes secondary sources that discuss Confederate women before, throughout, and after the Civil War, as well as a plethora of primary source documents, and combines them in ways that the historical community has not yet accomplished. Although some of these primary source documents are readily available and used by other historians, a large portion came from independent archival research undertaken at the Virginia Historical Society in Richmond, Virginia.9 This unique combination of sources provides new evidence on the topic of Southern women that has been overlooked by some historians who have focused on this area of study. 7 Elizabeth Fox Genovese, Within the Plantation Household: Black and White Women of the Old South (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1988); Catherine Clinton The Plantation Mistress: Woman’s World in the Old South (New York, NY: Pantheon Books, 1982). 8 See Stephanie McCurry, Confederate Reckoning. 9 The Virginia Historical Society deserves acknowledgement for the use of their archival material in this research project. Any source obtained from the institution will be designated by VAHS in the citation. The research completed was generously funded by the Haberberger Fellowship at Lycoming College. Reed 6 The first chapter of this study focuses on the political developments and how women came to be involved in public politics prior to the war. Outspoken women published their feelings on the political candidates (especially in election years), and men, in some cases, sought out their support and participation. These women influenced the thoughts of their husbands and, ultimately, were able to make their opinions public. Prior to the war, elite, white Virginian women infrequently published their thoughts, but were still able to convey their opinions.