Women at the Front Hospital Workers in Civil War America by Jane E

304 INDIANA MAGAZINE OF HISTORY diverse topics. Indeed, this diversity phy will interest all those curious leads to one of the few drawbacks in about science in early America-espe- the work-by covering so much back- cially about one brilliant, quirky char- ground for so many subjects Warren acter who helped create that science. often disrupts the narrative flow, leav- ing one hungrier for more of MICHAELLONG, School of Communi- Rafinesque and less of his times. Still, cations, Webster University, St. Louis, the reader comes away from this work Missouri, has published several arti- satisfied that Rafinesque at last has cles on the nineteenth-century physi- found the biographer he deserves, one cian and scientist George Engelmann, with sympathy for his subject, yet and is currently at work on a full- able to evaluate his shortcomings fair- length biography. ly and judiciously. Warren’s biogra- Women at the Front Hospital Workers in Civil War America By Jane E. Schultz (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2004. Pp. xiv, 360. Illustrations, charts, appen- dix, notes, bibliography, index. $34.95.) In Women at the Front Jane E. Schultz The author’s investigation of the significantly enriches the scholarship implications of social class, race, and surrounding women nurses of the region sheds new light on these Civil War. Her ambitious study of women who have largely escaped his- Union and Confederate caregivers torians’ notice. Analyzing Union hos- dispels traditional myths that portray pital records collected in 1890 for these women as superhuman, self- some 21,000 female workers, Schultz sacrificing embodiments of white develops a general nursing profile: middle-class morality. In the first part assignments as nurses and matrons of her work, Schultz establishes the were given primarily to white mid- broad panorama of women’s experi- dle-class women, while working- ences as hospital workers. In the sec- class, immigrant, and black women ond, she examines how wartime (both free and slave) often performed experiences affected women in the duties more like those of domestic aftermath of the conflict. Schultz service workers. Social class thus traces women’s adjustments to peace- helped to exclude all but about 6,000 .time society, their struggles for pen- out of 21,000 women workers in sions, and finally, the vast array of Union hospitals from eligibility for their narratives. the 1892 Army Nurses Pension Act. REVIEWS 305 Race was an even stronger factor, for concludes that few women had use- among the 2,000 women identified ful training. While few statistics iden- by hospital records, only one black tify the number of women who died woman is known to have received a as a result of their service, the author nurse’s pension. Racial tensions in might give more attention to the Union hospitals and camps were high, women who sacrificed their lives. and contraband runaway slave For students of Indiana history, women were especially subject to Schultz’s omission of the role played abuse. by the state sanitary commission, one Confederate nurses were legally of the most active in the Union, is ineligible for the federal plan. During disappointing. Future studies could the war, social class differences had also include the work of Dr. Chloe been the primary factor in work Annette Buckel, nurse trainer at the assignments in Confederate hospitals. gigantic Jefferson General Hospital A few socially privileged leaders like in Jeffersonville, Indiana, the med- Mary Livermore felt empowered by ical training of the Sisters of Saint their Civil War experiences, but Mary-of-the-Woods in Terre Haute, Schultz demonstrates that after the and a discussion, from rich archival war the vast majority of women nurs- sources, of Indianapolis nurses. es, North and South, struggled with Finally, Schultz fails to acknowledge the realities of poverty and race. two of Indiana’s best known Civil In the last section of the book, War nurses, pioneer physician and Schultz’s comprehensive survey of women’s rights leader Dr. Mary women’s written accounts of their Frame Thomas of Richmond and the nursing experiences raises intriguing intrepid Eliza George of Fort Wayne. questions about narrative voice, sec- Honored by the local soldiers’ aid tional bitterness, and changing gen- society and by the Indiana State San- der roles. In a study so comprehensive itary Commission, and given a full and vast, however, omissions and military burial, Eliza George and her occasional overstatements seem now-deteriorating monument in Fort inevitable. Schultz’s discussion of how Wayne’s Lindenwood Cemetary women received nursing appoint- remind us of the many talented and ments gives little attention to the con- dedicated women who too often flicting roles of state sanitary remain invisible. commissions, the U. S. Sanitary Com- Jane Schultz is to be commended mission, and the Christian Commis- nevertheless for an excellent study of sion. Given the popularity of Florence the women who played crucial roles Nightingale’s textbook on nursing and in a war that still has continuing lega- the practice of home nursing that cies. While not detracting from the included knowledge of homeopathic heroic efforts of thousands of Civil medicine, perhaps she too quickly War nurses, Women at the Front is a 306 INDIANA MAGAZINE OF HISTORY reminder of the social and racial strat- PEGGYSEIGEL‘S articles published in ification of American society and of the Indiana Magazine of History bitter sectional divisions that have include “Industrial ‘Girls’in an Early continued to fester into the twenty- Twentieth Century Boomtown: Tra- first century. Schultz’scomprehensive ditions and Change in Fort Wayne, study is essential reading for an Indiana, 1900-1920” (September understanding of women’s contribu- 2003) and “She Went to War: Indi- tions to the Civil War and to our ana Women Nurses in the Civil War” nation. (March 1990). The Civil War Soldier A Historical Reader Edited by Michael Barton and Larry M. Logue (New York New York University Press, 2002. Pp. xi, 515. Notes, tables, index. Paperbound, $24.95.) One of Michael Barton’s and Larry Union and Confederate soldiers?” Logue’s primary goals in assembling (p. 3).To bring out some of these dif- these twenty-seven articles and chap- ferences, they include Logue’s own ters is to introduce the non-profes- contribution on the efforts to recruit sional reader to the past twenty-five young men in Mississippi. Unlike years of Civil War research. Some ear- Northerners, these Mississippians lier writings are also included by way were overwhelmingly preoccupied of points of departure or foils for the with “society’sracial equilibrium: the newer scholarship. The focus is fear of life with the bottom rail on top entirely on the ordinary soldier, and echoes through soldiers’ explanations rarely are generals or politicians men- of why they were in the army” (p. 44). tioned. The editors summarize their Lope also makes us aware of the five-fold organization of the volume reluctance of Southern youth who under the headings: “Who the sol- lived in the counties along the Mis- diers were, how they lived, how they sissippi River to sign up for military fought, how they felt, and what they service. As often as not, they would believed” (p. 2). disappear west of the River. In the introduction, the editors Reinforcing the notion of dis- articulate their own scholarly predis- tinctiveness within the Confederate position. “In our own research we Army is an older (1957) but most have been deeply interested in one welcome article by David Donald. overarching question: What were the “The distinctive thing about the Con- essential social, cultural, and even federate army,” he writes, “is that psychological differences between Southern soldiers never truly accept- .

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