Prescott Library: US Civil War, 1861-1865, 7th Grade History: Women and the war effort on the home front and on the battlefield

Women and the War Effort

Articles from our databases

Women in the Civil War
When the Civil War began in the spring of 1861, the leaders of the women's movement, particularly Susan B. Anthony (1820-1906) and Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815-1902), faced a dilemma. Should they stop organizing for the vote, the ownership of property, child custody, and other rights? Or should they continue to pressure legislators while the nation was struggling for its very survival?
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"Women in the Civil War." Women in America. Woodbridge, CT: Primary Source Media, 1999. American Journey. U.S. History in Context. Web. 15 Oct. 2015.
Clara Barton
After the battle of Bull Run, she was greatly impressed by the stories she heard regarding the suffering on the field, due in part to lack of supplies. With characteristic independence, she advertised in the Worcester Spy for provisions for the wounded. They came pouring in, and she established a distributing agency.
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"Clara Barton." Dictionary of American Biography. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1936. U.S. History in Context. Web. 15 Oct. 2015.
Belle Boyd
Although most scholars agree that Boyd made important contributions to the Shenandoah Valley campaigns, some of the dramatic details of her memoir, Belle Boyd, in Camp and Prison, are still controversial.
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"Belle Boyd." Encyclopedia of the Confederacy. Ed. Richard Nelson Current. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1993. U.S. History in Context. Web. 29 Oct. 2015.
Dorothea Dix
Dorothea Lynde Dix (1802-1887) was an American reformer whose pioneer efforts to improve treatment of mental patients stimulated broad reforms in hospitals, jails, and asylums in the United States and abroad
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"Dorothea Lynde Dix." Encyclopedia of World Biography. Detroit: Gale, 1998. U.S. History in Context. Web. 29 Oct. 2015.
Spies in Petticoats
The article presents an overview of the vital roles of women's petticoats during the Civil War and the girls and women who served as spies during the war, including Belle Boyd, Elizabeth Van Lew, and Pauline Crushman.
Motherhood, Slavery and the Civil War
Many women writers of the time were against slavery, believing that it destroyed families by selling children away from their mothers. Following are some of those female authors, their reasons for writing, and a description of their published works.
Secret Soldiers
Presents information on several female soldiers during the U.S. Civil War
Confederate Spy
Focuses on the risk taken by Belle Boyd, a Confederate spy, in securing information about Union battle plans and troop movements for the Confederate army during the Civil War in the United States.
Private Albert Cashier's Secret
Profiles Albert Cashier, a woman named Jennie Hodgers who passed herself as a private in Illinois' 95th Infantry Regiment, Company G during the Civil War. Participation of Cashier in the campaign in Vicksburg, Mississippi; Details on her military career; Why she joined the army.
Angels of the Battlefield
More than twenty thousand women -- in both official and unofficial (many women simply assumed the duties of nurses when a battle took place near their homes) capacities -- served as nurses on both sides during the Civil War. Many felt that volunteering as a nurse was a way to help. Because the men rarely saw women during the war years, they called the nurses "angels of the battlefield."
Women Spies (History.com)
On August 23, 1861, the infamous Confederate spy Rose Greenhow was placed under arrest in Washington, D.C. One of hundreds of women who served as spies for either side during the Civil War, Greenhow is believed to have contributed to the South’s victory at the First Battle of Bull Run (Manassas).