Category: Civil War Women

Civil War Women
Civil War Women, Women Artists

Cornelia Adele Fassett

• Maggie

Painter of Politicians and Officials in Washington DC Cornelia Adele Fassett was an American artist known for her political paintings and portraits. Her most famous work, The Florida Case Before the Electoral Commission (1878), now hangs in the United States Capitol. Her paintings of the Supreme Court and Justices are in the art collection of the U.S. Supreme Court. Image: Cornelia Adele Strong Fassett Between 1865 and 1880 Library of Congress Personal Life Cornelia Adele Strong was born November 9, 1831 in Owasco, New York, the third of six children of Captain Walker Strong and Sarah Devoe Strong. Cornelia was raised in Jefferson, Ohio, where her father was a hotel keeper. On August 26, 1851 Cornelia married Samuel Montague Fassett,…

Read Article
Civil War Love Stories, Civil War Women, First Ladies

Lucy and Rutherford B. Hayes

• Maggie

A Civil War Love Story Born August 28, 1831 in Chillicothe, Ohio, Lucy Ware Webb was the daughter of physician James Webb and Maria Cook Webb. When Lucy was two years old, her father died of cholera while on a trip to Lexington, Kentucky to free slaves he had inherited from his aunt. Lucy developed strong abolitionist convictions from her father and grandfather, both of whom were slaveholders at one time. Image: Lucy and Rutherford B. Hayes Wedding photograph, December 30, 1852 In 1844 Maria Webb moved her family to Delaware, Ohio, where Lucy’s brothers enrolled at Ohio Wesleyan University. Lucy first met Rutherford Birchard Hayes on the Ohio Wesleyan campus in 1847. Later that year, Lucy enrolled at Wesleyan…

Read Article
Civil War Women, Gettysburg

Bliss Farm at Gettysburg

• Maggie

Hotly Contested Area on the Gettysburg Battlefield Image: Bliss Farm Markers in the distance honor the men who fought here and deliniate the site of the William Bliss Farm that once existed here. Mid-left, in front of the trees, honors the 14th Connecticut Infantry. The clump of earth behind it is the remains of the earthen ramp that once led into the Bliss Barn. To the right is the 12th New Jersey Infantry marker. On the far right, out of frame, a smaller marker stands where the Bliss farmhouse once was. These markers are the only physical testaments to the struggle that took place over this key location. Credit: Battle of Gettysburg Buff Bliss Farm After losing three of their…

Read Article
Civil War Women, Generals Wives

Mary Theodosia Palmer Banks

• Maggie

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,…

Read Article
Authors, Civil War Women

Celia Thaxter

• Maggie

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….

Read Article
Antietam, Civil War Nurses, Civil War Women

Poffenberger Farms of Antietam

• Maggie

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…

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

Mary Putnam Jacobi

• Maggie

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…

Read Article
Abolitionists, Activists, Civil War Women, Feminists

Josephine Sophia White Griffing

• Maggie

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…

Read Article
Abolitionists, Activists, Civil War Women, Famous Firsts

Josephine St. Pierre Ruffin

• Maggie

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,…

Read Article
Civil War Cities, Civil War Women

Spotsylvania Court House in the Civil War

• Maggie

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…

Read Article