Tag: Civil War nurses

Civil War nurses
Civil War Women, Generals Wives

Mary Theodosia Palmer Banks

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Wife of Union General Nathaniel Banks Mary Theodosia Palmer was born October 16, 1819 in Charlestown, Massachusetts, the daughter of Jeduthan and Sarah Palmer. In her youth, Mary worked at the spinning frame in a Waltham textile mill, where she met Nathaniel Prentice Banks, son of one of the foremen there. Banks had attended a one-room school run by his father’s company, and then began working at the mill as a bobbin boy, responsible for replacing bobbins full of thread with empty ones. He also assisted his father in making furniture, and after a few years apprenticed as a mechanic for the company. Image: Theodosia Palmer Banks By Matthew Brady, circa 1860 Nathaniel Banks subsequently edited several local weekly newspapers,…

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Authors, Civil War Women

Celia Thaxter

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Poet, Essayist and Independent Woman Image: Celia Thaxter at different stages of her life Credit: Seacoast New Hampshire Known as the Island poet, Celia Laighton Thaxter lived much of her life on the Isles of Shoals, a group of nine islands six miles off the coast of Maine and New Hampshire. She wrote primarily of her life on White, Smuttynose and Appledore islands. The darling of literary Boston, she attracted some of New England’s great writers and artists to her family’s hotel on Appledore. Early Years Celia Laighton was born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire June 29, 1835. In 1839 her father Thomas Laighton was hired as lighthouse keeper on White Island, Isles of Shoals off the coast of New Hampshire….

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Antietam, Civil War Nurses, Civil War Women

Poffenberger Farms of Antietam

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Field Hospitals at the Battle of Antietam During the Battle of Antietam, farms owned by Joseph, Samuel, Alfred and John Poffenberger were used and abused by military personnel. The families passed down stories of hiding livestock and household valuables from the hordes of soldiers who were plundering farms and homes. A teenager at the time, Otho Poffenberger, son of John Poffenberger, fled with other members of his family to the safety of Shepherdstown, four miles away in what is now West Virginia. Image: Joseph Poffenberger Farm Layout Image Credit: South From the North Woods Joseph Poffenberger Farm Joseph Poffenberger purchased this farm from his father-in-law in 1851. On the afternoon of September 16, 1862, the nearly 8,600 men of General…

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Activists, Civil War Women, Educators, Famous Firsts, Women Doctors

Mary Putnam Jacobi

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Pioneer for Women in the Medical Professions Mary Putnam Jacobi was a prominent physician, author, scientist, activist, educator, and perhaps most importantly, a staunch advocate of women’s right to seek medical education and training. Men in medicine claimed that a medical education would make women physically ill, and that women physicians endangered their profession. Jacobi worked to prove them wrong and argued that it was social restrictions that threatened female health. Image: Mary Corinna Putnam as a medical student, 1860s Jacobi was the most significant woman physician of her era and an outspoken advocate for women’s rights, rising to national prominence in the 1870s. She was a harsh critic of the exclusion of women from the professions, and a social…

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Abolitionists, Activists, Civil War Women, Feminists

Josephine Sophia White Griffing

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Activist in the Abolitionist and Women’s Rights Movements Image: Family of Slaves Washington, DC, 1861 Josephine Sophia White Griffing was a social reform activist who campaigned for the abolition of slavery and women’s rights. In 1864, she moved to our nation’s capital to help the newly freed slaves who were streaming into the capital by the thousands. Griffing worked primarily as an agent for the Freedmen’s Bureau in Washington, DC. Early Years Josephine White was born December 18, 1814 in Hebron, Connecticut into a prominent New England family. Her father Joseph White Jr. served as a representative in the state legislature; her mother was sister of portrait artist Samuel Lovett Waldo. Little is known of Josephine’s childhood, and there are…

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Abolitionists, Activists, Civil War Women, Famous Firsts

Josephine St. Pierre Ruffin

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Journalist and Founder of African American Women’s Clubs Josephine St. Pierre Ruffin was an African American leader, a publisher, journalist and editor of Women’s Era, the first newspaper published by and for African American women. She was an abolitionist and suffragist, and she is perhaps best remembered for her role in establishing clubs for African American women. Early Years Josephine St. Pierre was born August 31, 1842 in Boston, Massachusetts to John St. Pierre, a French and African man from Martinique, and Elizabeth Matilda Menhenick, a white woman from Cornwall, England. Her father was a very successful tailor in Boston and her family was a part of Boston society. Josephine received her education at public schools in Charlestown and Salem,…

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Civil War Cities, Civil War Women

Spotsylvania Court House in the Civil War

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Battle of Spotsylvania Court House On May 7, 1864, after two days of brutal fighting failed to produce a victory at The Wilderness, previous Union commanders would have chosen to withdraw behind the Rappahannock River. But General Ulysses S. Grant ordered General George Meade to move around Lee’s right flank and seize the important crossroads at Spotsylvania Court House to the southeast. Image: Bonnie Blue Flag by Don Troiani Mule Shoe, Spotsylvania Court House, May 12, 1864 With Federals pouring over the entrenchments, Confederate formations are in disarray. To encourage his comrades, Private Tisdale Stepp of the 14th North Carolina begins singing the stirring Southern anthem Bonnie Blue Flag and others soon join him. Elements of General Robert E. Lee‘s…

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Activists, Civil War Women, Famous Firsts, Women Doctors

Bella Chapin Barrows

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First Woman Eye Surgeon and Prison Reform Activist Image: Dr. Bella Chapin Barrows Credit: Hartland Historical Society Artist unknown Dr. Bella Chapin Barrows accomplished many firsts in her 68 years of life. She was the first woman employed by the U.S. State Department, first woman to have a private medical practice in Washington DC, first woman ophthalmologist (a specialist in eye ailments) in the United States, first woman eye surgeon, and first woman professor at a medical school (Howard University). Early Years Born Isabel Hayes April 17, 1845 in Irasburg, Vermont to Scottish immigrants Dr. Henry Hayes and Anna Gibb Hayes. Young Isabel – called Bella by everyone – helped her father on house calls by tending to wounds and…

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Civil War Women, Famous Firsts, Women Doctors

Susan McKinney Steward

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First African American Woman Doctor in New York Only five years after the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constition abolished slavery in the United States, Susan McKinney Steward graduated from medical school and became the first African American woman physician in New York and only the third black female doctor in the country. She practiced medicine in Brooklyn and Manhattan most of her life. Early Years Susan Maria Smith was born in Brooklyn, New York in the year 1847. She was the seventh of ten children born to Sylvanus and Anne Springstead Smith, who were both multi-racial. Her mother was the daughter of a Shinnecock Indian woman and a French colonel. Her father’s ancestors included a Montauk Indian and an African…

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Civil War Nurses, Civil War Women

Almira Fales

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Civil War Nurse from Washington DC Carte de Visite of Almira Fales From the Civil War era Almira Newcomb was born in Pittstown, New York, October 24, 1809. In 1829, she married merchant Alexander McNaughton. Together they had two children; Sarah (born 1830) and Alexander (born 1832). Not long after her son’s birth, both her husband and young daughter died. In 1837, Almira married an older widower, Leander Lockwood of Connecticut, who had five children from his first marriage. In 1840 or 1841, they left Connecticut for Burlington, Iowa, where they ran a hotel. While there, Almira had two more children, Charles and Thomas Hartbenton. Leander Lockwood died in 1845, leaving Almira with eight children: Alexander from her first marriage,…

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