The role of women in the US Civil War has historically been understated. But, from nurses to spies and even those who disguised themselves as men to join the army, women played key roles. Ashley Goss explains.
Frances Clayton, a woman who disguised herself as a man to fight for the Union Army in the US Civil War.
There’s this misconception that the American Civil War was a man’s fight when in reality hundreds of women worked on the front lines of the war as healthcare providers, in espionage and the fight itself. Most men of the era wrote about women helping from the home front and many movies portray plantation women during the war. However, women did far more than just send food and clothing to the front lines. Not only did women have an active role in the Civil War, their efforts had a lasting impact on America as a whole. Nurses like Clara Barton and Ada W. Bacot traveled miles away from home to care for wounded soldiers. Spies like Harriet Tubman and Elizabeth Van Lew snuck behind enemy lines to smuggle information and even people back home. Most astonishingly, women like Frances Clayton, Sarah Edmonds, Marian McKenzie and hundreds more disguised themselves as men and fought on the front lines. However, not many discuss or even know about these brave women and the influence their service had on the Women’s Suffrage movement. Nurses, spies and soldiers changed the course of the Civil War and the ideas of womanhood.
The Cult of Domesticity
During the 1800s many Americans believed in the Cult of Domesticity. The Cult of Domesticity was essentially a guideline to how women should behave, and in turn, traits that men should avoid. Women were expected to follow four cardinal virtues; piety, purity, submission and domesticity. ‘True women’ were delicate, soft and weak, did not engage in strenuous physical activity, and were the center of the family and home. Femininity also required a woman to seek a masculine working man while rejecting the values that work entailed, and the reverse was true for men. If any ‘respectable’ woman went against these rules, they were usually shunned and criticized. According to Catherine Beecher:
“Woman is to win everything by peace and love; by making herself so much respected, esteemed and loved… But the moment woman begins to feel the promptings of ambition, or the thirst for power, her aegis of defense is gone. All the sacred protection of religion, all the generous promptings of chivalry, all the poetry of romantic gallantry, depend upon woman’s retaining her place as dependent and defenseless, and making no claims, and maintaining no right but what are the gifts of honor, rectitude and love” (Grimke, 2020).
However, with the Civil War the idea of women staying in the home and being dependent on a husband started to change. Women were meant to be the moral center of the home and take care of their families. As more and more men were sent to the front, these barriers began to stretch outwards. The definition of home became debatable; moving from the house to the community, to the county, and eventually the country. Women started off by sending clothing and raising money for supplies. Plenty of women helped at home but many found that they needed to do more to help their men.
Nurses
Nurses played a vital role in assisting the army and helping them to continue the fight. Before the Civil War only men were allowed to be professional practicing nurses. Women were expected to be nurturing but not trained to handle a life-or-death situation, and certainly not paid for it. When the war started an adequate medical force was not a high priority for southern politicians because they thought the war would only last six months. As the war continued though and both sides needed more men to fight, women were integrated into nursing programs around the country. Most female nurses were treated more like housekeepers by the doctors and male nurses and not professionals, instead preparing food and keeping the soldiers’ company. According to Dorothea Dix a “respectable nurse” was over thirty, plain looking and refrained from wearing jewelry and hoop skirts (D’Antonio, 2002). However, as the body count kept rising these women started being treated as professional nurses and less like housekeepers. Even though it was jarring, women were ready for the challenge. After working hard for their new found independence and station it was hard for many women to return to their old submissive ways.
One woman who left home to become a nurse is Ada W. Bacot. Ada was an upper-class woman from South Carolina whose father was a plantation owner and a slaveholder. At the outbreak of the war all of Ada’s brothers saw some capacity of military service and her second husband was killed in a skirmish in Dandridge, Tennessee. When her first husband and two daughters died, all she wanted to do was serve her country. She applied for both a local and out of state nursing program but when she never received an offer, she went ahead to Virginia anyway to help at the South Carolina Association Hospital there. Like many nurses she found the hospital to be unhygienic and her role was very restricted. Ada’s job originally consisted of food preparation, laundry and reading the Bible to the men. However, as the wounded piled up and she became more acquainted with gruesome injuries, her role as a nurse was taken more seriously. She was now able to help more with injuries and had more of a say in the cleanliness of the hospital and her confidence grew along with her workload. In Ada’s own words, “tis gratification to be able to do anything for the poor men, they are so grateful. One man begged me to sit awhile with him he was so lonely” (Bacot, 1990). Now even though her drive to become a nurse had no feminist intent behind it, and she even believed in the Cult of Domesticity, by the end of the war Ada was financially independent, owned her own plantation and ran it herself. Even someone who fit most of the criteria for a ‘true woman’, Ada did not want to be dependent on or owe anyone anything.
Spies
Female spies also played a key role in the Civil War, helping with strategy, armory and even freeing slaves. Women were actually preferred over men in the first few years of the war because they were not searched as thoroughly as men. Those who crossed enemy lines hid arms, medicine, and other crucial material in hoop skirts, parasols, and corsets. Messages would also be written on buttons, silk, tissue and commonplace letters in imperceptible ink. Many female spies have been credited with helping in crucial battles. At the First Battle of Bull Run, Rose Greenhow channeled important information on timing, troop strength, and last-minute strategic decisions to Confederate generals. Belle Boyd became famous after she rushed across the battlefield to give Stonewall Jackson information on the Union troops he was about to attack. This job also required constant shifts in identity, and clearly required leaving home, and these women represented a slow rejection of any traditionally established set of values for women. In taking on the roles of men, these women challenged gender norms in the mid-nineteenth century.
One woman who volunteered her services to the war was Elizabeth Van Lew. Shortly after marrying, her mother Eliza, her father John moved them from Philadelphia to Richmond, Virginia and they integrated into Richmond’s high society. Despite her father owning about a dozen slaves, Elizabeth had a Quaker education in Philadelphia, so she was a staunch abolitionist and Unionist. After her father’s death Elizabeth and Eliza freed all of his slaves and even sold land to some of them cheaply. When the war broke out both Elizabeth and Eliza sided with the Union but made sure that those around them believed otherwise. They were able to convince General John Winder to allow them to help the Union soldiers in Libby Prison under the guise of female benevolence. They used this position to pass messages to and from prisoners and even helped some to escape. Eventually Elizabeth had several confidantes working inside and outside the prison to help with prison breaks and used her wealth and family mansion to hide and take care of escapees. In December of 1863 General Benjamin Butler heard about Elizabeth’s work and recruited her as a spy for the Union Army. By the end of the war Elizabeth amassed her own spy network of twelve people, employing both White and Black spies. During reconstruction President Ulysses S. Grant appointed Elizabeth the Postmaster General of Richmond. As Postmaster she used the office to promote women’s suffrage. However, many were not okay with a woman in political office, so as soon as Grant was out of office Elizabeth was replaced. She died in Richmond on September 25, 1900 at the age of ninety-two. Unfortunately, by the end of her life, Elizabeth “had spent much of her family’s fortune on behalf of Union soldiers and civilians, and ruined her family name in the eyes of her Richmond neighbors” by acting as a spy for the Union (Varon, 2005). Also, as good as she was, Elizabeth hated being labeled as a spy because it had negative connotations. In a letter to a friend she said, “I do not know how they can call me a spy serving my own country within its recognized borders…[for] my loyalty am I to be branded as a spy-by my own country, for which I was willing to lay down my life? Is that honorable or honest?” (Varon, 2005).
Disguised as men
The last and most radical group were women who disguised themselves as men to fight alongside their husbands and brothers. Many women in the North and South wanted to help in the war effort but felt their gender limited them; several stating “if only I was a man” in letters and diaries (Clinton, 1993). Some took the initiative to change that limiting factor by cutting off their hair, changing their name and enlisting. There are records of at least 250 women who served in the Union and Confederate armies, most of their names being lost to history. It was relatively easy to fool a regiment; many of the recruits were very young so it was common to see soldiers with no facial hair and a high-pitched voice. The uniform was also so oversized it easily hid a woman’s curves. Just like the men, these women also lived-in germ-infested camps, languished in appalling prisons, and died miserable but honorable deaths for their country. Both sides were aware that women were joining and although they did not really condone it, it was also hard to regulate. One Union soldier after the Battle of Reachtree Creek wrote to his wife about a wounded female rebel and said, “I hope our women will never be so foolish as to go to war or get to fighting” (Dunn, 1864). He must have been disappointed later.
One woman who not only served in the army in disguise but also served as a nurse and a spy to some degree was Sarah Edmonds. She was born Sarah Emma Edmondson but after suffering years of abuse from her father Sarah ran away and changed her last name to Edmonds. She was still worried her father might find her though, so to keep that from happening and to find a job she disguised herself as a man and changed her name to Franklin Thompson, getting a job as a Bible salesman in Hartford, Connecticut. When the war broke out Sarah was living in Michigan and being an ardent Unionist, she enlisted as a three-year recruit to the Second Michigan Infantry in 1861. She participated in the Seven Days Battle, the Battle of Williamsburg, the Second Battle of Bull Run, the Battle of Antietam, and the Battle of Fredericksburg. In fact, at the Battle of Fredericksburg she served as orderly to General Orlando M. Poe. During the battle she spent at least twelve uninterrupted hours riding back and forth under fire delivering messages between headquarters and the front. Throughout her service she acted as a foot soldier, a nurse, an orderly, a mail carrier and, according to her memoirs, a spy. She accepted every task with exceptional courage. Even twenty years later General Poe claimed that no one in the regiment had suspected that Thompson might have been a woman. In the spring of 1863 she contracted malaria and, out of fear of being discovered if she sought medical attention, she deserted. When the war ended, she wrote her memoirs, Nurse and Spy in the Union Army, and donated the profits to various soldiers’ aid groups. Although she never gave the name of her alias out of fear of being prosecuted for deserting. Finally, in 1884, she became the first woman to be awarded a military pension.
Conclusion
Many of these women’s stories go untold even though their work not only helped the war effort but the Woman’s Suffrage Movement as well. Before the Civil War a woman’s place was in the private sphere (home), and a man’s was in the public sphere. However, these women tested the boundaries of the ‘private sphere’ by asserting that their influence on the home extended to where ever their family was, so if their men needed them then they should follow. These stories helped showcase what women were capable of. Clara Barton claimed that their efforts advanced the social position of women by fifty years. Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony also used female front-line service as an example for why women should be equal to men who served alongside them. Ada Bacot, the most traditionally feminine of these women, even sent a letter to Stanton saying, “I am a property holder and tax payer [who] ought of right to vote and wish[es] to do so” (Varon, 2005). With their service and sacrifice these women didn’t just help their men but took the first steps toward the fight for Women’s Rights.
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Now read about the role of women in the Confederacy in the US Civil War here.
Bibliography
Bacot, Ada W. Diary of Ada W. Bacot, 1860-1863. Edited by Jean V Berlin, Readex Film Products, 1990.
Clinton, Catherine, and Nina Silber. Divided Houses: Gender and the Civil War. Oxford University Press, 1993.
D'Antonio, Patricia. “Nurses in War.” The Lancet. The Lancet Publishing Group, December 2002. https://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/lancet/PIIS0140-6736(02)11798-3.pdf.
Grimke, A., 2020. Grimke's Appeal. [online] Utc.iath.virginia.edu. Available at: <http://utc.iath.virginia.edu/abolitn/abesaegb4t.html> [Accessed 20 April 2020].
Long, Day by Day, 542; James L. Dunn to his wife, 22 July 1864, Correspondence of James L. Dunn (accession 8301), ALUVA; Judson Austin to his wife, 21 July 1864, Papers of Nina L. Ness (Judson L. Austin Letters), BHLUM.
Varon, Elizabeth R. Southern Lady, Yankee Spy: The True Story of Elizabeth Van Lew, a Union Agent in the Heart of the Confederacy. Oxford University Press, 2005.
