Most women were affected by the war in some way. Some leapt into the war effort working for various organizations, including the Ladies Hospital Aid Society, the Union Volunteer Refreshment Saloon, and the United States Christian Commission. Others performed activities on a more personal level, such as sewing individual items to be shipped to soldiers they knew. Such women's efforts certainly attest to the idea that women fought the war in their own ways on the home front and in doing so played a crucial role in helping the war effort.
While the vast majority of the papers reviewed here were written by ardent union women committed to the war effort, a few southern women are represented as well as some northern women who were not particularly interested in the war. Women from the states of Virginia and Georgia (see the letters of Augusta Chaucey Twiggs, Margaretta H. Jones Taylor, and Mary Clendenin Payne) provide a stark reminder of the Confederate perspectives on the war. Some Philadelphians, who did not believe the war was fought for the right reasons, demonstrated in their writings that all northern women were not in support of the war.
Those women who did help with the Union cause appear to fit into a general pattern, with few exceptions. For the most part, older women were more likely to participate through local organizations such as their churches or nearby hospitals by donating needed items or volunteering their personal time. Younger women interested in helping the Union cause seemed more willing to do something a distance from their homes, such as traveling to Washington or the battlefields with such organizations as the United States Christian and United States Sanitary Commissions. These younger women, often under the age of 30 and unmarried, were capable of being more active because they were mobile, often childless, and unencumbered with family or social constraints imposed upon many married women.
It became clear there was typically a distinction between women who had a loved one fighting or working for the government in Washington and those who did not. The women who wrote of a husband, brother, or son participating in some way were more likely to feel the need to contribute themselves, even if that meant simply sewing garments and sending them to soldiers they knew. Those who did not mention the war service of a family member, however, had less of a tendency to do something for the war effort, and if they wrote of the war at all it often consisted of war news culled from local newspapers and gossip about their local areas.
These conclusions are based on the assumption that if a woman knew a man involved in the war she would mention him in her letters or diaries. There are undoubtedly some exceptions to this rule: a woman may have deemed her letters or her journal an inappropriate place for that type of personal information or may have been so deeply concerned for her loved one that she could not write about it. With that caveat, the majority of women probably did make at least a passing reference to the military service of their friends or relations if that was part of their experience of the war.
Beyond the war effort, these letters and diaries provide an excellent study of the daily lives of women during the 1860s. The beliefs and routines each engaged in on a daily basis are often mentioned in great detail and include Christianity, spirituality, visits with friends, weather, children, and gardening.
This list was accumulated using both the Guide to the Manuscript Collections of The Historical Society of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia: The Historical Society of Pennsylvania, 1991) and the card catalog at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. Where possible, background information is provided with each summary. All quotes are annotated with dates, page numbers, and other necessary information. Unfortunately, biographical information about these women was at times difficult to find, so this is supplemented with information about husbands and male correspondents.
Diaries
Ashhurst, Mary Hazlehurst. Diaries (1863-1864)
Ashhurst Family Papers Collection No. 1992
Mary Ashhurst, wife of Lewis Ashhurst, a Philadelphia merchant and bank director, wrote daily journals throughout her life (1809-1890), including two during the war years. The first of these began in 1863, when Ashhurst was 54, and she described her daily routine in some detail. Religion and prayer were important to her, as she often referred to them in her entries. She spent a great deal of time sewing for soldiers she knew and mailing items to them when she could, which is a typical example of an older woman’s approach to helping the war effort.
Ashhurst kept abreast of the current events surrounding the Civil War, which by 1863 was raging throughout the South. She recorded Grant’s success in the southwest and the Battle of Vicksburg. In addition, Ashhurst noted local rumors of a Confederate invasion in the North and feared for the city of Philadelphia, where she resided during these years. Most of the information she repeated in her diary was derived from newspapers she had read.
Her remarks on the Battle of Gettysburg were detailed and in depth. She wrote of the fighting raging there and felt it was too close to her home for comfort. She prayed General Meade would “keep the Rebels from Philadelphia.” By July 4, she had read in the local papers that “Meade [had] repulsed Lee,” but there were “no particulars yet” as to the casualties and other statistics except that Meade had reportedly captured 7,000 prisoners.
In the second volume of her diary, beginning on November 9, 1864, Ashhurst wrote of the reelection of President Lincoln and how joyous she was with this outcome. He, she said, would bring “peace and prosperity” to the country and for that she was “truly thankful." Later, she noted his assassination and the attempted murder of Secretary of State William Seward. She wrote that these “two men stood between the South’s extreme measures.” Ashhurst noted the city was in a state of complete mourning and all the flags were “draped in black” while the nation tried to deal with this “great distress.”
Ashhurst’s diaries are rather hard to follow because she used initials rather than first names to identify people when she wrote about them. There were no months written on the entries, making it difficult to know when events were occurring. These diaries document an older woman with friends involved in the fighting who was interested in the war effort and concerned for her own safety as well as that of the soldiers.
Fisher, Elizabeth Ingersoll. Diaries
Fisher, Sydney George Collection Collection No. 1850B Box 2
Two of the diaries in this collection are from the Civil War years (April, 1861 to November, 1861, and November, 1861 to March, 1863). They document the life of Elizabeth Ingersoll Fisher (1815-1872), daughter of Charles Ingersoll and wife of Sidney George Fisher, a Philadelphia author and diarist, and note both war news and daily events.
Fisher was very interested in the war news reported in the newspapers. Although she mentioned some of her daily chores such as planting vegetables and flowers in her diary entries, she focused more on the national events surrounding the war. On April 20, 1861, in the first month of the war, she wrote, “There are neither mail nor telegrams from the South. People seem to be in better hopes that the Capital can be defended. So many troops have gone and are still going.” On July 5, Fisher noted the parade she saw in Philadelphia of the “Home Guard." "I would have liked to [have] seen the parade in Washington where there were two miles of troops on Pennsylvania Avenue.”
She wrote much of the local gossip about the war as well. Whenever she went to gatherings with friends they discussed the war to a great extent. “George, Sydney, and I dined at Brookwood - great deal of war talk and not inspiring.” Fisher wrote July 20, 1861, that the same friends talked of “troops in western Virginia, successful at Bull’s Run and thus on their way to Manassas Junction.”
On August 31, 1861, she wrote of the news that “Fremont has declared martial law in Missouri and that the slaves of all persons fighting or plotting against the U.S. government are free… he has gone a step further – and it is alarming.” Fisher, an older woman, did not appear to support the emancipation of slaves and she wrote more of a war fought to preserve the Union.
She did not write of anyone from her family fighting and never mentioned personally helping the war effort, thus fitting the pattern that older women did not lend a hand if they did not have family involved. Nonetheless, the war haunted her and was the topic of the majority of her writings. On September 14, 1861, Fisher wrote that she “had bad dreams last night about the war. [I] was in battles and when I awoke could not help thinking of dreadful scenes that might be going on there.” This was one of several instances when Fisher appeared to be concerned for her own personal safety.
Ashhurst Family Papers Collection No. 1992
Mary Ashhurst, wife of Lewis Ashhurst, a Philadelphia merchant and bank director, wrote daily journals throughout her life (1809-1890), including two during the war years. The first of these began in 1863, when Ashhurst was 54, and she described her daily routine in some detail. Religion and prayer were important to her, as she often referred to them in her entries. She spent a great deal of time sewing for soldiers she knew and mailing items to them when she could, which is a typical example of an older woman’s approach to helping the war effort.
Ashhurst kept abreast of the current events surrounding the Civil War, which by 1863 was raging throughout the South. She recorded Grant’s success in the southwest and the Battle of Vicksburg. In addition, Ashhurst noted local rumors of a Confederate invasion in the North and feared for the city of Philadelphia, where she resided during these years. Most of the information she repeated in her diary was derived from newspapers she had read.
Her remarks on the Battle of Gettysburg were detailed and in depth. She wrote of the fighting raging there and felt it was too close to her home for comfort. She prayed General Meade would “keep the Rebels from Philadelphia.” By July 4, she had read in the local papers that “Meade [had] repulsed Lee,” but there were “no particulars yet” as to the casualties and other statistics except that Meade had reportedly captured 7,000 prisoners.
In the second volume of her diary, beginning on November 9, 1864, Ashhurst wrote of the reelection of President Lincoln and how joyous she was with this outcome. He, she said, would bring “peace and prosperity” to the country and for that she was “truly thankful." Later, she noted his assassination and the attempted murder of Secretary of State William Seward. She wrote that these “two men stood between the South’s extreme measures.” Ashhurst noted the city was in a state of complete mourning and all the flags were “draped in black” while the nation tried to deal with this “great distress.”
Ashhurst’s diaries are rather hard to follow because she used initials rather than first names to identify people when she wrote about them. There were no months written on the entries, making it difficult to know when events were occurring. These diaries document an older woman with friends involved in the fighting who was interested in the war effort and concerned for her own safety as well as that of the soldiers.
Fisher, Elizabeth Ingersoll. Diaries
Fisher, Sydney George Collection Collection No. 1850B Box 2
Two of the diaries in this collection are from the Civil War years (April, 1861 to November, 1861, and November, 1861 to March, 1863). They document the life of Elizabeth Ingersoll Fisher (1815-1872), daughter of Charles Ingersoll and wife of Sidney George Fisher, a Philadelphia author and diarist, and note both war news and daily events.
Fisher was very interested in the war news reported in the newspapers. Although she mentioned some of her daily chores such as planting vegetables and flowers in her diary entries, she focused more on the national events surrounding the war. On April 20, 1861, in the first month of the war, she wrote, “There are neither mail nor telegrams from the South. People seem to be in better hopes that the Capital can be defended. So many troops have gone and are still going.” On July 5, Fisher noted the parade she saw in Philadelphia of the “Home Guard." "I would have liked to [have] seen the parade in Washington where there were two miles of troops on Pennsylvania Avenue.”
She wrote much of the local gossip about the war as well. Whenever she went to gatherings with friends they discussed the war to a great extent. “George, Sydney, and I dined at Brookwood - great deal of war talk and not inspiring.” Fisher wrote July 20, 1861, that the same friends talked of “troops in western Virginia, successful at Bull’s Run and thus on their way to Manassas Junction.”
On August 31, 1861, she wrote of the news that “Fremont has declared martial law in Missouri and that the slaves of all persons fighting or plotting against the U.S. government are free… he has gone a step further – and it is alarming.” Fisher, an older woman, did not appear to support the emancipation of slaves and she wrote more of a war fought to preserve the Union.
She did not write of anyone from her family fighting and never mentioned personally helping the war effort, thus fitting the pattern that older women did not lend a hand if they did not have family involved. Nonetheless, the war haunted her and was the topic of the majority of her writings. On September 14, 1861, Fisher wrote that she “had bad dreams last night about the war. [I] was in battles and when I awoke could not help thinking of dreadful scenes that might be going on there.” This was one of several instances when Fisher appeared to be concerned for her own personal safety.
Women's Rights Before the Civil War
by Laura Donnaway
To me, the sun in the heavens at noonday is not more visible than is the right of women, equally with man, to participate in all that concerns human welfare . . . ..
These words were penned in 1866 by Frederick Douglass, a former slave and avid rallier for abolition and women's rights. This was no small task. Women's struggle for equality was and is a long and hard battle. Though suffrage was gained in 1920, the struggle for equality continues into the present time. The women who embarked on this crusade in the mid-1800s were courageous, defying most respectable standards of their time to stand up for what they believed.
In the nineteenth century, most Americans assumed that there was a natural order in society which placed men and women in totally different spheres. The ideal woman was submissive; her job was to be a meek, obedient, loving wife who was totally subservient to the men around her.
Between 1750 and 1850, women's roles in America changed somewhat. In an agrarian society, it was necessary for both husband and wife to put in a full day's labor, for the success of the farm depended on them both.
Industrialization produced further changes. As factories began to do many of the things women had done at home previously, such as spinning and weaving, women were left with a little more time to devote to other projects. Clergymen began to recruit them for various reforms but always they, the women, would work in their proper sphere, influencing only the men In their family.
By the early 1800s women were ready to branch out from their families and make an impression on the world. Numerous women's organizations were formed, some social, but many bound on doing social work. "Female associations . . . ran charity schools, and refuges for women in need."
One of the first movements in which women took an active hand was the female seminary movement which began its serious phase about 1815. The leaders were Emma Willard, Catherine E. Beecher, Zilpah P. Grant, Mary Lyon and Joseph Emerson. They intended to improve the quality of women's education so that they could be good citizens and "mothers of future statesmen." They felt that young men and women should be educated separately and in a different fashion. While these leaders worked for improvements for women, they only worked for education and otherwise accepted the notion of the "appropriate sphere of women." They never became involved in the women's rights movement but they still contributed something important. The seminary movement proved that women had minds capable of serious study and opened the way for women to teach and manage institutions. This was an important, although small, step toward equality for women.
The American Revolution was fought for independence and equality. However, these ideals only applied to white males. As time went on this became the slogan of many oppressed groups.
The Jacksonian movement for democracy during the 1820s and 1830s furthered the idea of equality. As many northern businessmen began a push for abolition, women joined in the cause and were exposed to politics. Both the abolitionist movement and the upsurge of unionism were sources of the women's movement.
The rise of industrialization in the 1830s and the increasing numbers of working women prompted women to become involved in the labor movement. The women's labor unions which were formed worked mostly for better pay and better working conditions. The Female Labor Reform Association in New England, begun in 1844, was one of the nation's most significant. It eventually failed however, when the workers could not stand up to their employers.
Unlike the sisterhoods of religious benevolence or female seminaries, which complemented the efforts of male leaders, sisterhoods of labor threatened the authority and economic power of corporate leaders and investors.
One of the first female lecturers in the United States was Frances Wright. She spoke out for not only the political rights of working men but for equality for women, emancipation of the slaves, free religious inquiry, free public education for everyone, birth control, and equal treatment of illegitimate children.
In 1825, Wright bought land in western Tennessee to form a model community to help pave the way for the emancipation of the slaves. The community was called Nashoba. Donated slaves and those she bought with her own funds would be brought there to live. Each slave would be charged with his price and upkeep which was to be worked off on a credit system. Older slaves would learn a trade while younger ones would go to school. At the end of five years, they would be freed.
In 1826, Wright decided to make Nashoba not only an "example of gradual emancipation," but also "a pilot project for world reform."
People would come from around the world to join them in the search for happiness, liberty, and "the emancipation of the human mind."
Frances Wright's lecturing career was marked by opposition. She devoted her lectures to Nashoban ideals, attacking the clergy and speaking out for women's rights.
Until women assume the place in society which good sense and good feeling assign to them, human improvement must advance feebly. . .
Eventually Nashoba failed. Wright's vision of the community never materialized. The slaves were unhappy and Nashoba became a financial disaster. Frances Wright spent her fortune, "ruined her reputation, (and) violated all codes of respectability," but she left her mark and became a symbol to the feminists who came after her.
Wright was not the only woman to fight for emancipation, many women became involved in the movement in the 1830s and the 1840s.
In 1833, the American Anti-Slavery Society was formed. William Lloyd Garrison, one of the leaders of the society, was fervently for women's rights. Unfortunately the other members were not. When women were not allowed to sign the Declaration of Purposes, they formed the Female Anti-Slavery Society as an answer. The society spread and it became the target of much criticism. There was strong opposition to abolition and even stronger opposition toward the female abolition societies. Meetings were often mobbed and the hall was burnt down where the Anti-Slavery Convention of American Women was being held.
In 1836, Angelina Grimke wrote the pamphlet "An Appeal to the Christian Women of the Southern States" urging women to work for abolition. Though rejected in the South, the pamphlet was well received in the North. That same year Angelina and her sister Sarah arrived in New York as the first female abolitionist agents in the country. They were brought by the Female Anti-Slavery Society and assigned to give parlor talks to women. Their lectures soon began to attract larger and larger audiences so the meetings were moved to public auditoriums. The sisters were denounced by the clergy for going beyond women's "God-given place." As the Catholic spokesman Orestes Brownson put it:
We do not believe women . . . are fit to have their own head. Without masculine direction or control, she is out of her element and a social anomaly -- sometimes a hideous monster.
In response to this attack, the sisters began to speak out not only for abolition but also for women's rights. Sarah Grimke published a series of letters which drew a parallel between the conditions of women and slaves.
All I ask our brethren is that they take their feet from off our neck and permit us to stand upright on the ground which God destined for us to occupy.
Sarah felt that women should not have to ask for equal rights because they should belong naturally and morally to women. Many people felt that the crusade for women's rights would only damage the abolitionist movement. In 1840, the movement split into two factions -- one for and one against women's rights. At last, the question of women's status in society had become an issue upon which much attention was focused.
In 1840, in London, the World Anti-Slavery Convention was held. Women delegates who attended were denied seats and forced to sit in the gallery. Two of the delegates, Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, met there and became friends. Their efforts would eventually lead to the first Women's Rights Convention at Seneca Falls, New York in 1848.
The year 1848 was a "year of revolutions." Besides the Seneca Falls Convention, New York State passed the first Married Woman's Property Act. Anesthesia was used in childbirth for the first time despite the clergy claiming that women and doctors were ignoring the decree of God who said that "in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children." A new political party, the Free Soil Party, was formed. Its slogan of "Free Soil, Free Speech, Free Labor, and Free Men." reflected the idealism of the times.
Elizabeth Cady Stanton was a dominant force behind the Seneca Falls Convention. As a 33-year-old housewife and a mother of three, she could identify with women of the times. While having lea with Lucretia Mott and some other women, Stanton began to complain about the position of women in society. It was her idea to call the convention and she suggested a declaration to be modeled after the Declaration of Independence. In the declaration were listed all the forms of discrimination against women. These women pledged to use every means available to end discrimination. The demand for the right to vote passed by a small majority and only then because of the work of Stanton and Frederick Douglass. Many women wanted legal rights but believed that they weren't entitled to the vote because of their dependent state.
After the convention, the movement began to spread rapidly as conventions and meetings were held in many parts of the country during the 1850s. This activity was restricted, however, to the North and the West before the Civil War.
The white woman slave owners were supposed to be on a pedestal, but they were (metaphorically) chained to it and supposed to be silent.
In the West, where women had to work full-time on the farm the same as men did, suffrage was received better. In the North, women were treated as weak and less intelligent than men. Women began to be admitted to some Midwestern universities in the 1850s and 1860s, but only when the universities were short of students. This shortage was particularly obvious when many men went off to fight in the Civil War.
In the 1850s, Susan B. Anthony became involved in the women's movement. She became its best organizer. During the 1850s, Anthony became involved in the temperance movement. She believed that the only influence women had was in their own homes. She wished to bring (he temperance issue into politics but was frustrated by the lack of a role for women.
Amelia Bloomer, the publisher of the women's rights newspaper, The Lily, introduced Anthony to Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Together they formed the New York State Women's Temperance Society in 1852. Stanton wished to incorporate a women's rights program into the society but many of her radical ideas were hard for the women to accept, especially her advocacy of divorce reform. When the rule that men could not vote in the society was overturned, Stanton was deposed from the presidency. Anthony decided to retire from the society.
Anthony used the skills and contacts she had gained from the temperance movement to begin a campaign for women's rights during 1853-1854. Within a few months, she had secured over 10,000 signatures for her petition to the New York Legislature. This campaign culminated in the women's rights convention in Albany, New York, in 1854. The central event was Elizabeth Stanton's "Address to the Legislature" in which she argued that women's position under the law denied the fundamental truth that men and women are alike.
In 1860, after six years of hard work, New York passed the "first comprehensive reform in women's legal status, including full property, parental, and widow's rights, but no enfranchisement."
Also in 1860, Elizabeth Stanton delivered her "Speech to the Anniversary of the American Anti-Slavery Society" where she again illustrated the parallels between slavery and the oppression of women:
Herein is woman more fully identified with the slave than man can possibly be, for she can take the subjective view ... For while the man is born to do whatever he can, for the woman and the Negro, there is no such privilege.
During the Civil War, the women's movement died out as the women concentrated on abolition. After the war, they expected equality for both blacks and women but were disappointed when the Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments restricted the right to vote to male citizens. The abolitionist and women's movements split after this. The male abolitionists had been northern businessmen who wanted the black vote to ensure Republican victories in the South and the expansion of business in the North. Once satisfied, they quit as they saw nothing to gain from women's suffrage.
In spite of this major setback, the women's movement went on. It had been given a steady foundation by women such as Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony whose work was rewarded with the gain of women's suffrage when the Nineteenth Amendment was ratified on August 21, 1920
by Laura Donnaway
To me, the sun in the heavens at noonday is not more visible than is the right of women, equally with man, to participate in all that concerns human welfare . . . ..
These words were penned in 1866 by Frederick Douglass, a former slave and avid rallier for abolition and women's rights. This was no small task. Women's struggle for equality was and is a long and hard battle. Though suffrage was gained in 1920, the struggle for equality continues into the present time. The women who embarked on this crusade in the mid-1800s were courageous, defying most respectable standards of their time to stand up for what they believed.
In the nineteenth century, most Americans assumed that there was a natural order in society which placed men and women in totally different spheres. The ideal woman was submissive; her job was to be a meek, obedient, loving wife who was totally subservient to the men around her.
Between 1750 and 1850, women's roles in America changed somewhat. In an agrarian society, it was necessary for both husband and wife to put in a full day's labor, for the success of the farm depended on them both.
Industrialization produced further changes. As factories began to do many of the things women had done at home previously, such as spinning and weaving, women were left with a little more time to devote to other projects. Clergymen began to recruit them for various reforms but always they, the women, would work in their proper sphere, influencing only the men In their family.
By the early 1800s women were ready to branch out from their families and make an impression on the world. Numerous women's organizations were formed, some social, but many bound on doing social work. "Female associations . . . ran charity schools, and refuges for women in need."
One of the first movements in which women took an active hand was the female seminary movement which began its serious phase about 1815. The leaders were Emma Willard, Catherine E. Beecher, Zilpah P. Grant, Mary Lyon and Joseph Emerson. They intended to improve the quality of women's education so that they could be good citizens and "mothers of future statesmen." They felt that young men and women should be educated separately and in a different fashion. While these leaders worked for improvements for women, they only worked for education and otherwise accepted the notion of the "appropriate sphere of women." They never became involved in the women's rights movement but they still contributed something important. The seminary movement proved that women had minds capable of serious study and opened the way for women to teach and manage institutions. This was an important, although small, step toward equality for women.
The American Revolution was fought for independence and equality. However, these ideals only applied to white males. As time went on this became the slogan of many oppressed groups.
The Jacksonian movement for democracy during the 1820s and 1830s furthered the idea of equality. As many northern businessmen began a push for abolition, women joined in the cause and were exposed to politics. Both the abolitionist movement and the upsurge of unionism were sources of the women's movement.
The rise of industrialization in the 1830s and the increasing numbers of working women prompted women to become involved in the labor movement. The women's labor unions which were formed worked mostly for better pay and better working conditions. The Female Labor Reform Association in New England, begun in 1844, was one of the nation's most significant. It eventually failed however, when the workers could not stand up to their employers.
Unlike the sisterhoods of religious benevolence or female seminaries, which complemented the efforts of male leaders, sisterhoods of labor threatened the authority and economic power of corporate leaders and investors.
One of the first female lecturers in the United States was Frances Wright. She spoke out for not only the political rights of working men but for equality for women, emancipation of the slaves, free religious inquiry, free public education for everyone, birth control, and equal treatment of illegitimate children.
In 1825, Wright bought land in western Tennessee to form a model community to help pave the way for the emancipation of the slaves. The community was called Nashoba. Donated slaves and those she bought with her own funds would be brought there to live. Each slave would be charged with his price and upkeep which was to be worked off on a credit system. Older slaves would learn a trade while younger ones would go to school. At the end of five years, they would be freed.
In 1826, Wright decided to make Nashoba not only an "example of gradual emancipation," but also "a pilot project for world reform."
People would come from around the world to join them in the search for happiness, liberty, and "the emancipation of the human mind."
Frances Wright's lecturing career was marked by opposition. She devoted her lectures to Nashoban ideals, attacking the clergy and speaking out for women's rights.
Until women assume the place in society which good sense and good feeling assign to them, human improvement must advance feebly. . .
Eventually Nashoba failed. Wright's vision of the community never materialized. The slaves were unhappy and Nashoba became a financial disaster. Frances Wright spent her fortune, "ruined her reputation, (and) violated all codes of respectability," but she left her mark and became a symbol to the feminists who came after her.
Wright was not the only woman to fight for emancipation, many women became involved in the movement in the 1830s and the 1840s.
In 1833, the American Anti-Slavery Society was formed. William Lloyd Garrison, one of the leaders of the society, was fervently for women's rights. Unfortunately the other members were not. When women were not allowed to sign the Declaration of Purposes, they formed the Female Anti-Slavery Society as an answer. The society spread and it became the target of much criticism. There was strong opposition to abolition and even stronger opposition toward the female abolition societies. Meetings were often mobbed and the hall was burnt down where the Anti-Slavery Convention of American Women was being held.
In 1836, Angelina Grimke wrote the pamphlet "An Appeal to the Christian Women of the Southern States" urging women to work for abolition. Though rejected in the South, the pamphlet was well received in the North. That same year Angelina and her sister Sarah arrived in New York as the first female abolitionist agents in the country. They were brought by the Female Anti-Slavery Society and assigned to give parlor talks to women. Their lectures soon began to attract larger and larger audiences so the meetings were moved to public auditoriums. The sisters were denounced by the clergy for going beyond women's "God-given place." As the Catholic spokesman Orestes Brownson put it:
We do not believe women . . . are fit to have their own head. Without masculine direction or control, she is out of her element and a social anomaly -- sometimes a hideous monster.
In response to this attack, the sisters began to speak out not only for abolition but also for women's rights. Sarah Grimke published a series of letters which drew a parallel between the conditions of women and slaves.
All I ask our brethren is that they take their feet from off our neck and permit us to stand upright on the ground which God destined for us to occupy.
Sarah felt that women should not have to ask for equal rights because they should belong naturally and morally to women. Many people felt that the crusade for women's rights would only damage the abolitionist movement. In 1840, the movement split into two factions -- one for and one against women's rights. At last, the question of women's status in society had become an issue upon which much attention was focused.
In 1840, in London, the World Anti-Slavery Convention was held. Women delegates who attended were denied seats and forced to sit in the gallery. Two of the delegates, Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, met there and became friends. Their efforts would eventually lead to the first Women's Rights Convention at Seneca Falls, New York in 1848.
The year 1848 was a "year of revolutions." Besides the Seneca Falls Convention, New York State passed the first Married Woman's Property Act. Anesthesia was used in childbirth for the first time despite the clergy claiming that women and doctors were ignoring the decree of God who said that "in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children." A new political party, the Free Soil Party, was formed. Its slogan of "Free Soil, Free Speech, Free Labor, and Free Men." reflected the idealism of the times.
Elizabeth Cady Stanton was a dominant force behind the Seneca Falls Convention. As a 33-year-old housewife and a mother of three, she could identify with women of the times. While having lea with Lucretia Mott and some other women, Stanton began to complain about the position of women in society. It was her idea to call the convention and she suggested a declaration to be modeled after the Declaration of Independence. In the declaration were listed all the forms of discrimination against women. These women pledged to use every means available to end discrimination. The demand for the right to vote passed by a small majority and only then because of the work of Stanton and Frederick Douglass. Many women wanted legal rights but believed that they weren't entitled to the vote because of their dependent state.
After the convention, the movement began to spread rapidly as conventions and meetings were held in many parts of the country during the 1850s. This activity was restricted, however, to the North and the West before the Civil War.
The white woman slave owners were supposed to be on a pedestal, but they were (metaphorically) chained to it and supposed to be silent.
In the West, where women had to work full-time on the farm the same as men did, suffrage was received better. In the North, women were treated as weak and less intelligent than men. Women began to be admitted to some Midwestern universities in the 1850s and 1860s, but only when the universities were short of students. This shortage was particularly obvious when many men went off to fight in the Civil War.
In the 1850s, Susan B. Anthony became involved in the women's movement. She became its best organizer. During the 1850s, Anthony became involved in the temperance movement. She believed that the only influence women had was in their own homes. She wished to bring (he temperance issue into politics but was frustrated by the lack of a role for women.
Amelia Bloomer, the publisher of the women's rights newspaper, The Lily, introduced Anthony to Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Together they formed the New York State Women's Temperance Society in 1852. Stanton wished to incorporate a women's rights program into the society but many of her radical ideas were hard for the women to accept, especially her advocacy of divorce reform. When the rule that men could not vote in the society was overturned, Stanton was deposed from the presidency. Anthony decided to retire from the society.
Anthony used the skills and contacts she had gained from the temperance movement to begin a campaign for women's rights during 1853-1854. Within a few months, she had secured over 10,000 signatures for her petition to the New York Legislature. This campaign culminated in the women's rights convention in Albany, New York, in 1854. The central event was Elizabeth Stanton's "Address to the Legislature" in which she argued that women's position under the law denied the fundamental truth that men and women are alike.
In 1860, after six years of hard work, New York passed the "first comprehensive reform in women's legal status, including full property, parental, and widow's rights, but no enfranchisement."
Also in 1860, Elizabeth Stanton delivered her "Speech to the Anniversary of the American Anti-Slavery Society" where she again illustrated the parallels between slavery and the oppression of women:
Herein is woman more fully identified with the slave than man can possibly be, for she can take the subjective view ... For while the man is born to do whatever he can, for the woman and the Negro, there is no such privilege.
During the Civil War, the women's movement died out as the women concentrated on abolition. After the war, they expected equality for both blacks and women but were disappointed when the Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments restricted the right to vote to male citizens. The abolitionist and women's movements split after this. The male abolitionists had been northern businessmen who wanted the black vote to ensure Republican victories in the South and the expansion of business in the North. Once satisfied, they quit as they saw nothing to gain from women's suffrage.
In spite of this major setback, the women's movement went on. It had been given a steady foundation by women such as Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony whose work was rewarded with the gain of women's suffrage when the Nineteenth Amendment was ratified on August 21, 1920
Women’s Rights
From the Civil War to 1890.
The Civil War curtailed the women's rights conventions. Nevertheless, during the war Susan B. Anthony and other politically active reformers organized the Women's National Loyal League in New York to collect signatures on petitions urging the emancipation of slaves, which was achieved in 1865 with ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment.
By 1869 the women's rights movement had split into two factions: the National Woman Suffrage Association (NWSA), led by Stanton and Anthony, and the American Woman Suffrage Association (AWSA), supported by Lucy Stone and Antoinette Brown Blackwell. The NWSA, headquartered in New York, published The Revolution (1868-1872); the Boston-based AWSA, which emerged from the American Equal Rights Association and the New England Woman's Suffrage Association, published Woman's Journal (1870- ). The division resulted from the Republican party's readiness, by means of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, to grant equal protection and suffrage to African-American men while excluding women from these same rights. The NWSA, refusing to postpone women's claims, explicitly asserted white women's superiority over black men as potential voters. The AWSA took a more qualified position on this issue, reaffirming the prewar alliance between the antislavery and women's rights move ments. Further, while the NWSA was run exclusively by women, the AWSA included men and indeed granted them leadership positions. While the AWSA was linked to the Republican party, the Stanton-Anthony organization joined forces with Democratic party supporters of the cause. Beginning in the volatile Kansas woman suffrage campaign of 1867, Stanton and Anthony collaborated with George Francis Train, who celebrated the superiority of white, middle-class, educated women over the newly freed, black male population.
In the following decades, the AWSA encouraged the formation of woman suffrage associations at the state and local level. The NWSA used more confrontational tactics, promoting efforts of women to vote illegally. This strategy of storming the polls began in 1870, resulting in Anthony's arrest and prosecution in 1872-1873. The NWSA focus on constitutional rights led to its involvement in two important if unsuccessful Supreme Court cases. Bradwell v. Illinois (1873) denied Myra Bradwell the right to practice law, restricted women's rights to engage in other professions or public pursuits, and reaffirmed the distinction between women's basic civil rights and their political rights. In Minor v. Happersett (1875), the Court ruled that although women were "citizens" and "persons," this did not guarantee them the privilege of voting. These two cases made clear that state-level campaigns to secure the rights of citizenship held more promise than national campaigns. Even state-level campaigns, however, required long-term plans for changing public opinion and working with partisan politicians.
During the 1870s and 1880s, the demands for "equal rights" or "women's rights" faced competition from a new political ideology, "Home Protection," advocated by Frances Willard of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU). This new wave of reform emphasized certain traditional values, particularly the ideal of women's vital domestic role, and stressed women's moral distinctiveness rather than their political equality. Under Willard's leadership, the WCTU gained over 200,000 members in the 1880s, built a national grassroots organization, and established local alliances with state politicians. The WCTU did not escape racism, especially as it organized in southern states. By playing upon fears of sexual assault by drunken men, the WCTU contributed to the "southern rape complex" that southern white politicians used to justify the lynching of black men.
From 1890 to 1920.
State campaigns brought some success. Women won the right to vote in Colorado in 1893, relying on support from the WCTU, the Populist party, and the Colorado State Equal Suffrage League. In 1890, the two wings of the movement joined to form the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA), a union long pursued by Susan B. Anthony, the first president of the new organization. Race remained divisive, however, as the NAWSA excluded black women in an attempt to retain support from southern white women. But in 1906, NAWSA president Anna Howard Shaw (1847-1919) refused to endorse the racist campaigns in the South, arguing that woman suffrage should not promote racial exploitation.
Dramatic changes came around 1910, as the woman suffrage campaign emerged as a "feminist" movement. A new cadre of leaders, including Harriot Stanton Blatch (daughter of Elizabeth Cady Stanton), Carrie Chapman Catt, Jane Addams, and Alice Paul (1885-1977), argued for suffrage not only as a matter of justice, but also as a solution to such political and social problems as prostitution, labor exploitation, and municipal corruption, thus linking it to the powerful wave of Progressive political reform. Distancing themselves from the nativist and racist agendas of the late nineteenth century, the new leaders even attempted to form alliances with immigrant men through their support for child-labor laws and literacy campaigns. By linking suffrage to social policy at the state level, the NAWSA laid the foundation for a larger national campaign to amend the federal Constitution. This final push for suffrage, initiated in 1914, culminated in 1920 with ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment, guaranteeing women's right to vote.
Although women had many moral obligations and duties in the home, church and community, they had few political and legal rights in the new republic. When Abigail Adams reminded her husband John during the Constitutional Convention to "Remember the Ladies!" her warning went unheeded. Women were pushed to the sidelines as dependents of men, without the power to bring suit, make contracts, own property, or vote. During the era of the "cult of domesticity," a woman was seen merely as a way of enhancing the social status of her husband. By the 1830s and 40s, however, the climate began to change when a number of bold, outspoken women championed diverse social reforms of prostitution, capital punishment, prisons, war, alcohol, and, most significantly, slavery.
Activists began to question women's subservience to men and called for rallying around the abolitionist movement as a way of calling attention to all human rights. Two influential Southern sisters, Angelina and Sarah Grimke, called for women to "participate in the freeing and educating of slaves."Elizabeth Cady Stanton's daughter kept a scrapbook of her mother's activities with the women's rights movement, now housed at the Library of Congress.
Harriet Wilson became the first African-American to publish a novel sounding the theme of racism. The heart and voice of the movement, nevertheless, was in New England. Lucretia Mott, an educated Bostonian, was one of the most powerful advocates of reform, who acted as a bridge between the feminist and the abolitionist movement and endured fierce criticism wherever she spoke. Sarah Margaret Fuller wrote Women in the Nineteenth Century, the first mature consideration of feminism and edited The Dial for the Transcendental Club.
Around 1840 the abolitionist movement was split over the acceptance of female speakers and officers. Ultimately snubbed as a delegate to a World Anti-Slavery Convention in London, Elizabeth Cady Stanton returned to America in 1848 and organized the first convention for women's rights in Seneca Falls, New York. Under the leadership of Stanton, Mott, and Susan B. Anthony, the convention demanded improved laws regarding child custody, divorce, and property rights. They argued that women deserved equal wages and career opportunities in law, medicine, education and the ministry. First and foremost among their demands was suffrage — the right to vote. The women's rights movement in America had begun in earnest. Amelia Bloomer began publishing The Lily, which also advocated "the emancipation of women from temperance, intemperance, injustice, prejudice, and bigotry." She also advocated the wearing of pantaloons for women that would allow for greater mobility than the expected Victorian costume — now these garments are called "bloomers."
Sarah Grimke and her sister Angelina Grimke Weld came from a slaveholding family in South Carolina. Their involvement in the abolitionist movement eventually lead to their involvement in the struggle for women's rights.As with the Civil War, the seeds of the quest for women's rights were sown in the Declaration of Independence, claiming that "all men are created equal." Sarah Grimke wrote in 1837 that "men and women were created equal ... whatever is right for men to do is right for women." That language was mirrored in the Seneca Falls Declaration. Thus, in this era of reform and renewal women realized that if they were going to push for equality, they needed to ignore criticism and what was then considered acceptable social behavior. The new republic's experiment in government was going to need all of its citizens to have "every path laid open" to them. However, the ardent feminists discovered that many people felt women neither should nor could be equal to men. The nation soon became distracted by sectional tension and the climate for reform evaporated. This important struggle would continue for many generations to come.
During the tumultuous years of the Civil War, women who did not have a right to vote, own property and had few civic liberties of their own, unified in support of the war efforts. Women who had not worked a day in their lives, with grit and determination hid their identity and took up arms of their own, cared for sick and dying soldiers, risked their lives to gather information, cooked, cleaned and care for children. The tenacity and love with which these women served their country was astounding, and yet often overlooked. Although women were not allowed to serve in the army, that did not stop some women from disguising themselves as men and taking up arms. Women would create masculine names and hide their identity from officials. We do not know how many women served because they did so secretly. On occasion, their sex was revealed. Mary Owens, after being shot in the armed, was discovered to be female. Upon returning home, despite her sex, she was received warmly. Both the Union and Confederate army refused to acknowledge that women had served. During wartime, women who were not fighting also played very important roles. When battle began, both armies were unprepared for the wounded. Women with no medical training would rush out to the front lines to help injured soldiers. Within two months, it was decided that Dorothea Dix would be appointed Superintendent of Nurses. Ms. Dix had high standards for women wishing to serve as nurses. Women were to be over the age of thirty, plain looking, wear service dresses, and be interviewed by her personally. These nurses worked strenuously 12 hour shifts sometimes attending to forty patients at a time. Many nurses literally worked themselves to death. A good chronicle of the life of a nurse is Louisa May Alcott's "Hospital Sketches." Some women chose to nurse independent of Ms. Dix. One such woman was Clara Carton who would later be credited as founder of the American Red Cross. To help assist in the war efforts she would collect and distribute necessities to the soldiers.Another common job for a woman during the civil war was to become a spy. Since legally they could not serve on the battlefield, some woman anxious to help the war efforts would engage in espionage. One famous spy during that time was Mrs. Rose O'Neal Greenhow. Since she socialized in political circles she was able to gather and pass along information. Being a spy was a very dangerous contribution to the war effort. If discovered you could be killed or disowned. Another job a woman could serve in was being part of the Womens Central Relief Association. This relief organization would gather and distribute items to the battlefield. Women would make uniforms, blankets and bandages, were responsible for keeping inventory, passing out items, and sending thank yous and requests for more supplies. In addition to the above duties, women took it upon themselves to raise money to support this organization. Soon hospitals, kitchens and transportation were being set up and operated by these ladies. A Vivandiere was another job a woman could legally do. These women usually followed their husbands or brothers into service and would serve as personal nurses to them if they were to sustain injury. In the camps, they took it upon themselves to clean, feed, and tend to camp while the men were off fighting. Other jobs women did during the war were writing and printing wartime pamphlets, taking over positions for their husbands to support their families, teaching, and raising their families in political unrest. Women served patriotically in the wartime effort sometimes receiving little or no praise. Many women died tending to wounds, distributing tools and fighting in their own right. The contribution of women during the American Civil War made an enormous impact.
From the Civil War to 1890.
The Civil War curtailed the women's rights conventions. Nevertheless, during the war Susan B. Anthony and other politically active reformers organized the Women's National Loyal League in New York to collect signatures on petitions urging the emancipation of slaves, which was achieved in 1865 with ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment.
By 1869 the women's rights movement had split into two factions: the National Woman Suffrage Association (NWSA), led by Stanton and Anthony, and the American Woman Suffrage Association (AWSA), supported by Lucy Stone and Antoinette Brown Blackwell. The NWSA, headquartered in New York, published The Revolution (1868-1872); the Boston-based AWSA, which emerged from the American Equal Rights Association and the New England Woman's Suffrage Association, published Woman's Journal (1870- ). The division resulted from the Republican party's readiness, by means of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, to grant equal protection and suffrage to African-American men while excluding women from these same rights. The NWSA, refusing to postpone women's claims, explicitly asserted white women's superiority over black men as potential voters. The AWSA took a more qualified position on this issue, reaffirming the prewar alliance between the antislavery and women's rights move ments. Further, while the NWSA was run exclusively by women, the AWSA included men and indeed granted them leadership positions. While the AWSA was linked to the Republican party, the Stanton-Anthony organization joined forces with Democratic party supporters of the cause. Beginning in the volatile Kansas woman suffrage campaign of 1867, Stanton and Anthony collaborated with George Francis Train, who celebrated the superiority of white, middle-class, educated women over the newly freed, black male population.
In the following decades, the AWSA encouraged the formation of woman suffrage associations at the state and local level. The NWSA used more confrontational tactics, promoting efforts of women to vote illegally. This strategy of storming the polls began in 1870, resulting in Anthony's arrest and prosecution in 1872-1873. The NWSA focus on constitutional rights led to its involvement in two important if unsuccessful Supreme Court cases. Bradwell v. Illinois (1873) denied Myra Bradwell the right to practice law, restricted women's rights to engage in other professions or public pursuits, and reaffirmed the distinction between women's basic civil rights and their political rights. In Minor v. Happersett (1875), the Court ruled that although women were "citizens" and "persons," this did not guarantee them the privilege of voting. These two cases made clear that state-level campaigns to secure the rights of citizenship held more promise than national campaigns. Even state-level campaigns, however, required long-term plans for changing public opinion and working with partisan politicians.
During the 1870s and 1880s, the demands for "equal rights" or "women's rights" faced competition from a new political ideology, "Home Protection," advocated by Frances Willard of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU). This new wave of reform emphasized certain traditional values, particularly the ideal of women's vital domestic role, and stressed women's moral distinctiveness rather than their political equality. Under Willard's leadership, the WCTU gained over 200,000 members in the 1880s, built a national grassroots organization, and established local alliances with state politicians. The WCTU did not escape racism, especially as it organized in southern states. By playing upon fears of sexual assault by drunken men, the WCTU contributed to the "southern rape complex" that southern white politicians used to justify the lynching of black men.
From 1890 to 1920.
State campaigns brought some success. Women won the right to vote in Colorado in 1893, relying on support from the WCTU, the Populist party, and the Colorado State Equal Suffrage League. In 1890, the two wings of the movement joined to form the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA), a union long pursued by Susan B. Anthony, the first president of the new organization. Race remained divisive, however, as the NAWSA excluded black women in an attempt to retain support from southern white women. But in 1906, NAWSA president Anna Howard Shaw (1847-1919) refused to endorse the racist campaigns in the South, arguing that woman suffrage should not promote racial exploitation.
Dramatic changes came around 1910, as the woman suffrage campaign emerged as a "feminist" movement. A new cadre of leaders, including Harriot Stanton Blatch (daughter of Elizabeth Cady Stanton), Carrie Chapman Catt, Jane Addams, and Alice Paul (1885-1977), argued for suffrage not only as a matter of justice, but also as a solution to such political and social problems as prostitution, labor exploitation, and municipal corruption, thus linking it to the powerful wave of Progressive political reform. Distancing themselves from the nativist and racist agendas of the late nineteenth century, the new leaders even attempted to form alliances with immigrant men through their support for child-labor laws and literacy campaigns. By linking suffrage to social policy at the state level, the NAWSA laid the foundation for a larger national campaign to amend the federal Constitution. This final push for suffrage, initiated in 1914, culminated in 1920 with ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment, guaranteeing women's right to vote.
Although women had many moral obligations and duties in the home, church and community, they had few political and legal rights in the new republic. When Abigail Adams reminded her husband John during the Constitutional Convention to "Remember the Ladies!" her warning went unheeded. Women were pushed to the sidelines as dependents of men, without the power to bring suit, make contracts, own property, or vote. During the era of the "cult of domesticity," a woman was seen merely as a way of enhancing the social status of her husband. By the 1830s and 40s, however, the climate began to change when a number of bold, outspoken women championed diverse social reforms of prostitution, capital punishment, prisons, war, alcohol, and, most significantly, slavery.
Activists began to question women's subservience to men and called for rallying around the abolitionist movement as a way of calling attention to all human rights. Two influential Southern sisters, Angelina and Sarah Grimke, called for women to "participate in the freeing and educating of slaves."Elizabeth Cady Stanton's daughter kept a scrapbook of her mother's activities with the women's rights movement, now housed at the Library of Congress.
Harriet Wilson became the first African-American to publish a novel sounding the theme of racism. The heart and voice of the movement, nevertheless, was in New England. Lucretia Mott, an educated Bostonian, was one of the most powerful advocates of reform, who acted as a bridge between the feminist and the abolitionist movement and endured fierce criticism wherever she spoke. Sarah Margaret Fuller wrote Women in the Nineteenth Century, the first mature consideration of feminism and edited The Dial for the Transcendental Club.
Around 1840 the abolitionist movement was split over the acceptance of female speakers and officers. Ultimately snubbed as a delegate to a World Anti-Slavery Convention in London, Elizabeth Cady Stanton returned to America in 1848 and organized the first convention for women's rights in Seneca Falls, New York. Under the leadership of Stanton, Mott, and Susan B. Anthony, the convention demanded improved laws regarding child custody, divorce, and property rights. They argued that women deserved equal wages and career opportunities in law, medicine, education and the ministry. First and foremost among their demands was suffrage — the right to vote. The women's rights movement in America had begun in earnest. Amelia Bloomer began publishing The Lily, which also advocated "the emancipation of women from temperance, intemperance, injustice, prejudice, and bigotry." She also advocated the wearing of pantaloons for women that would allow for greater mobility than the expected Victorian costume — now these garments are called "bloomers."
Sarah Grimke and her sister Angelina Grimke Weld came from a slaveholding family in South Carolina. Their involvement in the abolitionist movement eventually lead to their involvement in the struggle for women's rights.As with the Civil War, the seeds of the quest for women's rights were sown in the Declaration of Independence, claiming that "all men are created equal." Sarah Grimke wrote in 1837 that "men and women were created equal ... whatever is right for men to do is right for women." That language was mirrored in the Seneca Falls Declaration. Thus, in this era of reform and renewal women realized that if they were going to push for equality, they needed to ignore criticism and what was then considered acceptable social behavior. The new republic's experiment in government was going to need all of its citizens to have "every path laid open" to them. However, the ardent feminists discovered that many people felt women neither should nor could be equal to men. The nation soon became distracted by sectional tension and the climate for reform evaporated. This important struggle would continue for many generations to come.
During the tumultuous years of the Civil War, women who did not have a right to vote, own property and had few civic liberties of their own, unified in support of the war efforts. Women who had not worked a day in their lives, with grit and determination hid their identity and took up arms of their own, cared for sick and dying soldiers, risked their lives to gather information, cooked, cleaned and care for children. The tenacity and love with which these women served their country was astounding, and yet often overlooked. Although women were not allowed to serve in the army, that did not stop some women from disguising themselves as men and taking up arms. Women would create masculine names and hide their identity from officials. We do not know how many women served because they did so secretly. On occasion, their sex was revealed. Mary Owens, after being shot in the armed, was discovered to be female. Upon returning home, despite her sex, she was received warmly. Both the Union and Confederate army refused to acknowledge that women had served. During wartime, women who were not fighting also played very important roles. When battle began, both armies were unprepared for the wounded. Women with no medical training would rush out to the front lines to help injured soldiers. Within two months, it was decided that Dorothea Dix would be appointed Superintendent of Nurses. Ms. Dix had high standards for women wishing to serve as nurses. Women were to be over the age of thirty, plain looking, wear service dresses, and be interviewed by her personally. These nurses worked strenuously 12 hour shifts sometimes attending to forty patients at a time. Many nurses literally worked themselves to death. A good chronicle of the life of a nurse is Louisa May Alcott's "Hospital Sketches." Some women chose to nurse independent of Ms. Dix. One such woman was Clara Carton who would later be credited as founder of the American Red Cross. To help assist in the war efforts she would collect and distribute necessities to the soldiers.Another common job for a woman during the civil war was to become a spy. Since legally they could not serve on the battlefield, some woman anxious to help the war efforts would engage in espionage. One famous spy during that time was Mrs. Rose O'Neal Greenhow. Since she socialized in political circles she was able to gather and pass along information. Being a spy was a very dangerous contribution to the war effort. If discovered you could be killed or disowned. Another job a woman could serve in was being part of the Womens Central Relief Association. This relief organization would gather and distribute items to the battlefield. Women would make uniforms, blankets and bandages, were responsible for keeping inventory, passing out items, and sending thank yous and requests for more supplies. In addition to the above duties, women took it upon themselves to raise money to support this organization. Soon hospitals, kitchens and transportation were being set up and operated by these ladies. A Vivandiere was another job a woman could legally do. These women usually followed their husbands or brothers into service and would serve as personal nurses to them if they were to sustain injury. In the camps, they took it upon themselves to clean, feed, and tend to camp while the men were off fighting. Other jobs women did during the war were writing and printing wartime pamphlets, taking over positions for their husbands to support their families, teaching, and raising their families in political unrest. Women served patriotically in the wartime effort sometimes receiving little or no praise. Many women died tending to wounds, distributing tools and fighting in their own right. The contribution of women during the American Civil War made an enormous impact.