Category: Female Soldiers

Women Who Served in the Civil War Cavalry It is impossible to state with any certainty how many women served as cavalry soldiers in the Union and Confederate armies. The cavalry was considered more glamorous than infantry and artillery, but females who made it in the cavalry had to be excellent horsewomen, in addition to their other soldierly duties. Stories romanticizing their adventurous spirits and extolling their patriotism appeared in the New York Times, the Richmond Examiner and the Chicago Daily Tribune. Image: Federal Cavalry Charge! at Gettysburg Is there a cavalrywoman in this painting? Cavalrywomen Despite the physical strain, a few women are known to have served in the cavalry branches of both the Union and the Confederate armies….

Women Who Fought in the Civil War They were determined to fight, no matter the cost. They dressed in men’s clothing and assumed masculine names; bound their breasts; rubbed dirt on their faces to simulate whiskers; learned to talk, walk, chew and smoke like men; and hid in every conceivable way that they were female. They were soldiers in the Civil War. Both the Union and Confederate Armies forbade the enlistment of women, but historians have estimated that some 400 women went to war (there were probably more), some without anyone ever discovering their gender. Because they passed as men, it is impossible to judge how many women soldiers served in the Civil War. Some joined the army out of…

Woman Soldier in the Civil War Sarah Rosetta Wakeman disguised herself as a man in order to fight for the Union in the Civil War. The letters she wrote home were preserved by her family, but were not made public for nearly a century because they were stored in the attic of one of her relatives. Wakeman, most often referred to as Rosetta, was born on January 16, 1843, in Afton, New York, to Harvey Anable and Emily Wakeman. She worked hard on her father’s dairy farm to help support her family, and later worked as a domestic. Her father served as town constable, but was deeply in debt. At the age of 19, Rosetta left home and traveled to…

Female Soldier Disguised as a Man Loreta Janeta Velazquez was born into an aristocratic Cuban family in Havana in 1842. Her father was a Spanish government official who owned plantations in Mexico and Cuba. As a young girl, Loreta developed an admiration for Joan of Arc, and expressed a desire to emulate her deeds and to make a name for herself as a woman of courage who would fight for a great cause. In her early teens, Loreta was sent to New Orleans, where she attended Catholic schools and was educated in English, Spanish, and French. She met a dashing young officer in the United States Army named William. Since her family disapproved of the relationship, she eloped with him…

Union Nurse, Soldier and Spy Offended by the idea of slavery, Sarah Emma Edmonds enlisted in the Second Michigan Infantry as Frank Thompson on May 25, 1861, when the first call for volunteers came from President Abraham Lincoln. She was given the rank of Private, and was assigned as a male nurse at the field hospital of the 2nd Michigan Volunteers. In her own words, she “went to war with no other ambition than to nurse the sick and care for the wounded.” Early Years Born in 1842 in Nova Scotia, Sarah Emma Edmonds began life in a strict religious home where her father resented her for not being a boy. Emma endured her early childhood in Canada, trying to…

Female Soldier in the Civil War Several hundred women disguised themselves as men and took the bold step of leaving the comforts of home to serve their country during the Civil War. Frances Clalin Clayton disguised herself as a man and took the name Jack Williams in order to fight in the army. For several months, she served in Missouri artillery and cavalry corps. Frances Clalin was born in Illinois in the 1830s. She married Elmer Clayton and gave birth to three children. The Claytons lived on a farm in Minnesota. Some women dressed like men and marched off to war with a relative. Others enlisted because they had no means to support themselves after their loved one left home….

Female Militia in Georgia Near the beginning of the Civil War, almost all of the men of LaGrange, Georgia, enlisted in the Confederate Army, leaving the small town unprotected. Two upper-class ladies and some graduates of the LaGrange Female College decided that they should gather the women and form a female militia to help protect their community. They called themselves the Nancy Harts in honor of Georgia’s Revolutionary War heroine, who single-handedly defended her home against a group of invading British soldiers. Nancy Colquitt Hill Morgan had been married for only 6 months, and was only 21 years of age when her husband left for war. Mary Cade Alford Heard was 27 when her husband left, leaving her in charge…