Women’s Roles in the US Civil War
Shalom Lamm is a former managing member of Lion & Lamm Development in New York City. A historian who has published several essays, Shalom Lamm has appeared on-air to discuss the United States Civil War.
The US Civil War put an end to slavery and went a long way toward the emancipation of women. Women played an ostensibly huge role in the Civil War for both the Union and the Confederacy.
Before the war, women were largely relegated to home duties. When the war broke out in 1861, however, thousands of women volunteered in both the North and South.
Women organized aid societies that supplied troops with food, clothing, bedding, and cash. Women planted vegetable gardens, cooked, baked, and sent canned food to soldiers. Women sewed uniforms, mended blankets, and laundered clothes for soldiers. Women also organized fundraisers in support of the troops.
Almost 20,000 women worked as laundresses, matrons, and cooks in military strongholds. Another 3,000 women worked as nurses for sick or injured soldiers.
Some women worked across enemy lines as spies, collecting information from one side and disseminating it to the other. Over 400 women disguised themselves as men to fight on the front lines. After the war, America was compelled to redefine womanhood.
