Tag: women doctors

Wife of Union General Charles Russell Lowell Josephine Shaw Lowell (1843-1905) was a social reformer who is best known for creating the New York Consumers League in 1890. She recognized that low wages and unemployment were primary causes of poverty, and began to support organized labor and binding arbitration. Lowell raised money for striking garment workers and boycotted stores that underpaid and overworked their salesgirls. Image: Josephine Shaw Lowell in 1869 Josephine Shaw was born on December 16, 1843, in West Roxbury, Massachusetts, into a wealthy New England family. Her parents, Francis George and Sarah Blake Shaw, were philanthropists and intellectuals who encouraged their five children to study, learn and become involved in their communities. The Shaws were wealthy Bostonians…

Wife of Union General Fitz John Porter Fitz John Porter was a career U.S. Army officer and a Union General during the Civil War. He is most known for his performance at the Second Battle of Bull Run and his subsequent court martial, caused by his political rivals. After the war, he worked for almost 25 years to reclaim his reputation and restore his name to the army’s roll. Image: General Fitz John Porter Harriet Pierson Cook was born in New York in May 1833. Fitz John Porter was born on August 31, 1822, in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. He came from a family prominent in American naval service; his cousins were Admirals David Dixon Porter, and David Glasgow Farragut. Nevertheless,…

Wife of Union General Strong Vincent At Gettysburg, under his own initiative, Colonel Strong Vincent moved his men to Little Round Top and saved that important hill from immediate capture by the Confederates. Image: Save the Ground at All Hazard By Keith Rocco Elizabeth Vincent had bade goodbye to her husband Strong Vincent the day after their wedding, as he left to fight in the Civil War. On the Gettysburg battlefield, Pennsylvanians like Vincent were fighting to defend their home state against an invasion by the Army of Northern Virginia, commanded by General Robert E. Lee. Strong Vincent was born on June 17, 1837, in Waterford, Erie County, Pennsylvania, son of Bethuel B. Vincent and Sarah Ann Strong Vincent. In…

Wife of Confederate Major General William Henry Fitzhugh Lee Charlotte Wickham was the child of George Wickham of the U.S. Navy and Charlotte Carter Wickham, daughter of Williams Carter of Shirley Plantation. This estate, with its attractive mansion in Charles City County, Virginia has been the seat of the Carter and Hill Families since 1638. Charlotte’s mother died while she was a baby, so Charlotte was raised at Shirley. Image: Shirley Plantation Childhood home of Charlotte Lee In earlier times, guests arrived by boat along the James River, where they looked up to see the front of this perfectly proportioned Georgian Colonial house. Shirley Plantation was begun in 1613, making it the oldest in Virginia, and to this day its…

Wife of Union General Grenville Mullen Dodge Ruth Anne Brown was born on May 23, 1833, in Peru, Illinois. Grenville Mullen Dodge was born in Putnamville, near Danvers, Massachusetts, on April 12, 1831, to Sylvanus and Julia Theresa Phillips Dodge. From the time of his birth until he was 13 years old, Dodge moved frequently while his father tried various occupations. In 1844, the fortunes of Sylvanus Dodge improved. An ardent Democrat, he became postmaster of the South Danvers office and opened a bookstore. Good fortune also was in store for the young Dodge. While working at a neighboring farm, the 14-year-old met the owner’s son, Frederick Lander, and helped him survey a railroad. Lander was impressed with Dodge and…

Wife of Confederate General John Singleton Mosby Pauline Clarke was born in Kentucky on March 30, 1837. Her father, Beverly J. Clarke, was an active attorney and a former US Congressman and diplomat from Franklin, Kentucky. John Singleton Mosby was born on December 6, 1833, at his maternal grandfather’s home, Edgemont, in Powhatan County, Virginia. Raised in Nelson and then Albemarle counties, Virginia, little is known of his childhood, other than that he was a frail, sickly child – so frail, in fact, that he was relieved of most chores as a child. Like many in the Virginia middle class, his family owned slaves, one (Aaron Burton) was very close to him. Although an antsy student, he loved history. Because…

Wife of Confederate Major General Henry Heth Harriet Cary Selden was born on October 13, 1834, in Richmond, Virginia. Henry Heth (pronounced Heeth) was born on December 16, 1825, at Black Heath in Chesterfield County, Virginia. He was the son of Margaret L. Pickett and Navy Captain John Heth, a United States Navy officer in the War of 1812. He was the cousin of General George Pickett. Everyone called young Heth, “Harry,” the name also preferred by his grandfather, American Revolutionary War Colonel, also named Henry Heth, who had established the family in the coal business in the Virginia Colony after emigrating from England in 1759. Image: General Henry Heth Heth refused an appointment to the Naval Academy at Annapolis…

Wife of General John C. Breckinridge Mary Cyrene Burch was born in 1826, the daughter of Clifton Rhodes Burch and Alethia Viley Burch. Born at Cabell’s Dale, the family estate near Lexington, Kentucky, on January 16, 1821, John Cabell Breckinridge was named for his father and grandfather. His grandfather, the first John Breckinridge was a U.S. senator and served as attorney general for President Thomas Jefferson. His father, Joseph Cabell Breckinridge, a rising young politician, died at the state capital at the age of thirty-five. Image: Husband of Mary Breckinridge Vice President John Cabell Breckinridge Left without resources, John’s mother, Mary Clay Smith Breckinridge, took her children back to Cabell’s Dale to live with their paternal grandmother, known affectionately as…

Wife of Union General Henry Wager Halleck Elizaeth Hamilton Halleck was a natural subject for Matthew Brady’s camera and for E. & H. T. Anthony’s series of cartes de visite devoted to the new celebrities created by the early years of the Civil War. Elizabeth Hamilton was born February 9, 1835 in Westernville, New York. She was the daughter of Colonel John Church Hamilton, and granddaughter of Alexander Hamilton. While the death of Alexander Hamilton, in the historic duel with Aaron Burr, left the family in dire financial circumstances, Elizabeth’s father was, nevertheless, able to graduate from Columbia College in 1809. Henry Wager Halleck was born on January 16, 1815, in Westernville, New York, to Joseph Halleck and Catherine Wager…

Wife of Union General Henry Warner Slocum Henry Warner Slocum was born on September 24, 1827, in Delphi Falls, New York. He was the sixth child of eleven born to Matthew Barnard Slocum and Mary Ostrander Slocum. Image: General Henry Slocum Along with the other children in the area, Henry attended the Delphi Public School. In addition to school, Henry helped out in his father’s store. To raise extra money, he raised sheep. Henry attended Cazenovia Seminary in nearby Madison County, and at age 16 received a Public School Teacher’s Certificate. He worked as a teacher in the winter of 1847-48 in a one-room school in the hamlet of New Woodstock. In 1848, Henry Slocum received an appointment to the…