Category: Civil War Women

Civil War Women
Authors, Civil War Women, Women in Business

Women of Civil War Waterford

• Maggie

Union Newspaperwomen in Confederate Virginia Image: Lida and Lizzie Dutton During the years preceding the Civil War, Quakers in Loudoun County, Virginia lived in a heated political situation. After their state seceded from the Union, they struggled to remain pacifists in the presence of Confederate troops. But three girl journalists in the town of Waterford had no problem asserting their support for the Union. Educating the Dutton Girls Like most Quakers, John and Emma Dutton of Loudoun County, Waterford, Virginia believed that girls should be as well educated as boys. The Duttons home schooled their daughters Emma Eliza (called Lida) and Elizabeth (known as Lizzie) at home, and encouraged them to exercise full use of their minds. Their cousin Sarah…

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Civil War Nurses, Civil War Women

Women of the U.S. Sanitary Commission

• Maggie

Patriots Who Volunteered to Aid Union Soldiers Image: Men and women volunteers in the backyard of the United States Sanitary Commission depot at Fredericksburg, Virginia The U.S. Sanitary Commission opened hospitals, organized supplies and educated government officials. Women volunteers raised money, collected donations, made uniforms, worked as nurses, cooked in army camps, and served on hospital ships and at Soldiers’ Homes. They organized Sanitary Fairs in numerous cities to support the Federal army and the work of the USSC. Backstory Abraham Lincoln’s victory in the presidential election of 1860 triggered South Carolina’s secession from the Union in December 1860; ten other states would follow their lead in the coming months. Women throughout America held their collective breath. Reverend Dr. Henry…

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Civil War Nurses, Civil War Women, Gettysburg

Sophronia Bucklin

• Maggie

Civil War Nurse from New York Image: Sophronia Bucklin Nurse at Camp Letterman General Hospital Gettysburg, Pennsylvania Born in New York State in 1828, Sophronia Bucklin was a seamstress before the war, but put aside her needle and thread to nurse wounded Union soldiers. In her memoirs, In Hospital and Camp: A Woman’s Record of Thrilling Incidents among the Wounded in the Late War (1869), Bucklin recorded her experiences. Eager to do her part for the war effort, Bucklin offered her services as a nurse: The same patriotism which took the young and brave from workshop and plow, from counting rooms, and college hall… lent also to our hearts its thrilling measure, and sent us out to do and dare…

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Civil War Cities, Civil War Women

Civil War Nashville

• Maggie

First State Capital to Fall to the Union Army Image: View of Nashville from the steps of the Capitol Building, with Union artillery in place Nashville, Tennessee was an extremely important city during the Civil War. It was in the top 50 of the most populous cities with 17,000 residents. After Fort Donelson fell to Union troops February 16, 1862, Confederate authorities surrendered Nashville to Union forces without firing a shot. Union Occupation In February 1862, Confederate leadership surrendered two strategic Tennessee forts. A Union Army and Navy team under General Ulysses S. Grant took Fort Henry on the Tennessee River (February 6), and then captured Fort Donelson (February 16), only twelve miles from Nashville. After the fall of the…

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Civil War Women, Generals Wives

Widows of Gettysburg

• Maggie

Wives of Generals Killed at Gettysburg Image: Barksdale’s Charge by Don Troiani Confederate General William Barksdale – his hat off, his long white hair blowing in the wind – led his Mississippi brigade into battle to break the Union Line on the afternoon of July 2, 1863 at Gettysburg. This action would forever after be known as the grandest charge ever made by mortal man. Narcissa Saunders Barksdale and the General’s Dog William Barksdale, senator turned general, originally from Tennessee, moved to Mississippi as a young man, and settled near Columbus, where he studied law and was admitted to the bar. In 1849 Barksdale married Narcissa Saunders, who brought twenty slaves, horses, mules, and several wagon loads of household goods…

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Activists, Civil War Women, Women in Religion

Olympia Brown

• Maggie

Suffragist and the First Woman Minister in the United States Olympia Brown was a suffragist, the first woman to graduate from a theological school, and the first woman minister in the United States.* In 1863, the Universalist Church ordained Brown, the first woman ordained by that denomination. She was also one of the first generation suffragists who survived long enough to vote after the Nineteenth Amendment was passed in 1920. Image: Olympia Brown in 1919 *Antoinette Brown Blackwell is often considered the first American woman minister (1853). She was ordained by a Congregationalist church in Butler, New York, but the Congregationalist denomination did not approve her ordination. Olympia Brown was fully ordained by the church; Blackwell was not. Early Years…

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Activists, Civil War Women, Feminists

Women’s Rights After the Civil War

• Maggie

Feminists and Activists for Women’s Equal Rights Image: Executive Committee of the National Woman Suffrage Association (1869) Women fought for more than 200 years to obtain the rights that were guaranteed to men in the U.S. Constitution. When the nineteenth century began, a woman was not permitted to vote or hold office; she had few rights to her own property or earnings; she could not take custody of her children if she divorced; she did not have access to a higher education. Birth of Feminism In the 1830s, thousands of women were involved in the movement to abolish slavery. While working to secure freedom for African Americans, these women began to see legal similarities between their situation and that of…

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Civil War Women, Gettysburg

Mary Thompson House

• Maggie

General Robert E. Lee’s Headquarters at Gettysburg Image: Thompson House before the Battle of Gettysburg This one and a half story stone house sits on Seminary Ridge, west of the town of Gettysburg, on the north side of the Chambersburg Pike. On July 1, 1863 General Robert E. Lee established his headquarters here. It was an ideal location, at the center and rear of the Confederate battle lines. Anna Mary Long was born on November 12, 1793 near Littlestown, Pennsylvania. Her first husband was named Daniel Sell, with whom she had three daughters. Sell died at the age of 30 in 1822. Four years later she married Joshua Thompson, with whom she would have two sons and three daughters. Joshua…

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Civil War Women, Educators

Lucretia Crocker

• Maggie

Pioneer Educator and Innovative Administrator As the first woman appointed to the Board of Supervisors of the Boston Public School System (1876), Lucretia Crocker pioneered the method of teaching mathematics and the natural sciences during her decade-long tenure. Earlier, she was among the first women elected to the Boston School Committee, and a strong advocate for higher education for women. Early Years Lucretia Crocker was born December 31, 1829 in Barnstable, Massachusetts on Cape Cod to Henry and Lydia Ferris Crocker. She was educated in the Boston Public Schools, and attended the State Normal School in West Newton, Massachusetts. Established by Horace Mann, it was the first state-supported school dedicated to training teachers in America. She graduated in 1850, but…

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Civil War Nurses, Civil War Women

Euphemia Goldsborough

• Maggie

Confederate Nurse and Smuggler from Maryland Euphemia Goldsborough exemplifies the Southern woman committed to the Confederacy. Against all odds and at great risk to her own personal safety, she smuggled necessities into Southern hospitals and Northern prisons. Her story is one of courage, compassion and endurance. Image: Euphemia Goldsborough at age 38 Early Years Euphemia Goldsborough was born June 5, 1836 at Boston, the family farm on Dividing Creek in Talbot County, Maryland. Euphemia was one of eight children born to Martin and Ann Hayward Goldsborough. She studied at a girls’ boarding school in Tallahassee, Florida during the 1850s, and then joined her family at their new home in Baltimore, Maryland. Leading up to the Civil War, Marylanders had mixed…

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