Women on the Battlefield

WomenontheBattlefield:AnOverview throughout, that whenever there was a chance of giving Spencer, Ambrose. A Narrative of Andersonville: fresh air, an additional or better ration or an opportunity DrawnfromtheEvidenceElicitedontheTrialof of purchasing a little vegetables, it was reserved for men Henry Wirz the Jailer: With the Argument of who came from Belle Island, as they were the men ColonelN.P.Chipman,JudgeAdvocate.New who[se] incarceration had been the most protracted’’ York: Harper and Brothers, 1866. (Boate 2004, p. 37). Weld, Stephen Minot. War Diary and Letters of The harshness of prison life was a reality attested to Stephen Minot Weld 1861–1865. 1912. almost without exception in surviving accounts of prison Reprint, Boston: Massachusetts Historical life. Prison existence was however, recalled with an Society, 1979. admirable lack of animosity and in a detached, objective Robbie C. Smith manner by those who suffered within its grasp. Edward Boate, as an example, processed his experience and con- sidered his captors in a most compassionate and non- n judgmental fashion. Similarly, what grace the pages of a Women on the Battlefield surprising number of letters, diaries and memoirs in spite WOMENONTHEBATTLEFIELD: AN OVERVIEW of the baseless inhumanity of living conditions, is the Caryn E. Neumann endurance of the human will and the resilience of the WOMEN SOLDIERS human spirit. Caryn E. Neumann VISITING WIVES AND RELATIVES BIBLIOGRAPHY Caryn E. Neumann Benson, Berry. Berry Benson’s Civil War Book: Memoirs of a Confederate Scout and Sharpshooter. Edited by PROSTITUTES AND OTHER CAMP FOLLOWERS Susan Williams Benson. Athens: University of Caryn E. Neumann Georgia Press, 1992. Boate, Edward Wellington. An Andersonville Prisoner’s WOMENONTHEBATTLEFIELD: Defense of Captain Henry Wirz: The New York Daily AN OVERVIEW News Letters and Washington Testimony of Edward While their numbers were relatively small, the Civil War Wellington Boate. Compiled by James West battlefield included women in addition to men. Thou- Thompson. Jackson: Jackson Civil War Roundtable, sands of Union and Confederate women aided their 2004. country’s war effort as nurses, laundresses, and cooks. Butler, Benjamin F. Butler’s Book. Boston: A. M. Thayer Some of the more daring served as local scouts, spies & Co., 1892. attached to the military, and, in rare cases, as soldiers. Dooley, John. John Dooley Confederate Soldier. Georgetown: The Georgetown University Press, 1945. Spies and Scouts Fairbanks, Charles. Notes of Army and Prison Life Advances in military technology meant that the Civil 1862–1865. Edited by Janet Hayward Burnham. War battlefield could extend over a wide span of terri- Bethel: My Little Jessie Press, 2004. tory, particularly in such situations as the siege of Vicks- Grant, Ulysses Simpson. The Papers of Ulysses S. Grant. burg. Spies crossed battlefields to provide critical Vol. 10. January 1–May 31, 1864. Edited by John Y. information on troop movements; their job was just as Simon. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University dangerous as soldiering (Blanton 2002, p. 120). Women Press, 1982. spies could more easily evade detection than men partly Malone, Bartlett Yancey. Whipt’ em Everytime, the Diary because they did not raise the same degree of suspicion. th of Bartlett Yancey Malone: Co. H, 6 N. C. A Confederate spy, Mary Ann Pitman (alias Molly Hays, Regiment. 1960. Reprint, Edited by William Charles Thompson, and Second Lieutenant Rawley) of Whatley Pierson, Jr. Wilmington: Broadfoot Tennessee, often slipped through Union lines by pre- Publishing Company, 1987. tending to be a loyal citizen who had information that Merrell, W. H. Five Months in Rebeldom, or, Notes from she would impart only to the commanding officer. Once the Diary of a Bull Run Prisoner, at Richmond. inside the lines, Pitman had little trouble persuading Rochester, NY: Adams and Dabney, 1862. younger staff officers to show her the defenses and posi- Oake, William Royal. On the Skirmish Line Behind a tions of troops and fortifications (pp. 89–90). Friendly Tree. Edited by Stacy Dale Allen. Helena: Prostitutes also visited battlefields to ply their trade, Farcountry Press, 2006. but at the risk of being mistaken for spies. Shortly after the Ratchford, J. W. Some Reminiscences of Persons and conclusion of the Battle of Nashville in 1864, two prosti- Incidents of the Civil War. 1908. Reprint, Austin: tutes took a carriage out to the battlefield. The women Shoal Creek Publishers, 1971. ventured so far out that they were captured by Confederate GALE LIBRARY OF DAILY LIFE: AMERICAN CIVIL WAR 57 Women on the Battlefield: An Overview cavalrymen who suspected them to be spies. The women were briefly jailed in Franklin, Tennessee, before being escorted back to Nashville (Blanton 2002, pp. 124–125). Combatants and Support Personnel Some women worked in male guise on the battlefield as combatants, teamsters (drivers of teams of horses used to pull cannon and other heavy equipment), or mule drivers, but many more appear to have served as musicians in regimental bands. Drummers did not need the upper body strength required in other battlefield occupations. Edmonia Gates spent six months as a Union teamster as well as a stint as a drummer boy in Wilson’s Zouaves, the One Hundred and Twenty-first New York Infantry Reg- iment. Rebecca Peterman served as a drummer in the Seventh Wisconsin Infantry before abandoning music to become a scout. An anonymous Union woman wounded at Gettysburg served as a drummer, as did Fanny Harris of Indiana, who reportedly ‘‘passed through a dozen battles.’’ Because many women looked like teenaged boys too young for regular enlistment, their only possible entry into the army was through the ranks of the musicians. At least a half-dozen women are known to have served through the war as drummers (Blanton 2002, pp. 50, 57, 71). In addition to serving in the ranks, women also served in various headquarters commands. A Union soldier, Ida Remington, spent part of her two-year enlistment detailed as an officer’s servant. Two girls from Pennsylvania, including one using the alias of Charles Norton of the One Hundred and Forty-First Pennsylvania Infantry, also served in regimental headquarters as personal aides to Mary Ann Ball ‘‘Mother’’ Bickerdyke. A volunteer nurse from officers. Norton cooked, nursed, kept guard over the Illinois, Mary Ann Ball ‘‘Mother’’ Bickerdyke organized the nursing property of the officers, and did whatever other jobs were of wounded Union soldiers on the battlefield, earning respect from assigned to her. During the Battle of Fredericksburg, soldiers and generals alike for her practical determination to help the Sarah Edmonds served as an orderly to General Poe. Ella injured. She continued to help soldiers after the war, becoming an Hobart Gibson was elected chaplain of the First Wisconsin attorney and assisting veterans with legal matters. ª Bettmann/Corbis. Regiment of Heavy Artillery in 1864 and served for nine months in that capacity (Blanton 2002, pp. 41, 157). Soldiers who were discovered to be women often ‘‘was on every march and every battle field with the 81st persuaded officers to permit them to stay with their Ohio’’ (p. 117). For practical reasons, Finnern stayed in regiment as nurses or laundresses. If they could not be male attire even after her sex was known to everyone in soldiers, they would be useful in other ways while still the regiment. She was also a pragmatist who ‘‘in times of remaining with their loved ones. Thomas L. Livermore danger . carried a musket just as did the soldiers’’ (p. reported that a laundress attached to the Irish brigade 117). Finnern drew no army pay for her work as a nurse advanced with the unit at the Battle of Antietam in 1862 and surgeon’s assistant. Sarah Satronia enlisted in an Iowa and ‘‘swung her bonnet around and cheered on the regiment with her husband and remained undiscovered men’’ (Wiley 1952, p. 339) At the Battle of Port Hud- for about two months. Her commanding officer then son in 1862, Mrs. Bradley, the ‘‘wife of a 2d sergeant in allowed her to stay with the unit as a battlefield nurse. a company of Miles’ Legion was struck in the leg by a Mary Brown, the wife of Private Ivory Brown of the piece of shell . She suffered amputation, but died soon Thirty-First Maine Infantry, also stayed with the regiment after’’ (Hewitt 1983, p. 80). when she was discovered to be a woman. She worked as a Elizabeth Finnern stayed with her regiment after she nurse and surgeon’s assistant (p. 117). was discovered to be a woman. She worked both as a battlefield nurse and a surgeon’s assistant in the regimental hospital. One veteran recalled some years later that Battlefield Nursing Finnern ‘‘went through all Marches and battles with us’’ In the mid-nineteenth century, professional nursing was (Blanton 2002, p. 116–117). Another declared that she largely a male occupation. Fewer than four thousand 58 GALE LIBRARY OF DAILY LIFE: AMERICAN CIVIL WAR WomenontheBattlefield:AnOverview women served as paid nurses for the Union Army. Nei- uate the wounded, Bickerdyke decided that the most ther the number of paid Confederate nurses nor the pressing need for nursing assistance was at the front. women on both sides who nursed without compensation She joined General Ulysses S. Grant’s army as it moved is recorded with any accuracy. Frances Jamieson, also to take control of the Mississippi River. For seven known as Frank Abel, left her Union cavalry regiment months, Bickerdyke worked at Union field hospitals in after the death of her husband at First Bull Run and Savannah, Tennessee; Iuka, Mississippi; and Corinth, joined the Hospital Corps as a nurse. Jamieson assisted Mississippi. When challenged by an army surgeon who with amputations as well as other surgical theater nurs- asked under whose authority she fed the wounded men, ing duties.

Load more