Occupied Women : Gender, Military Occupation, and the American Civil War

by Whites, Leeann; Long, Alecia P.

• ISBN13: 9780807134405
• ISBN10: 0807134406
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2009-06-15
• Publisher: Louisiana State Univ Pr

Summary

This Collection of 11 essays by academics and independent scholars from across the US focuses on "the often unacknowledged" roles of women-black and white, Northern and Southern women predominate. Several of the contributors do not acknowledge that for women or civilians, life in a combat zone or under an occupying army is never easy. They write indignant treaties about the invasion of privacy and insults, although physical violence and death were seldom present. Given the guerilla wars that preceded the war and continued afterward, the level of abuse was modest. The essays on Southern women loyal to the Union, black women's experiences with both Union and Confederate armies, and graphic description of civilian life near the Battle of Gettysburg provide useful, interesting information. Those on Butler and Sherman ignore impossible situation, such as spying and provisioning by Confederate women. Further, Sherman's march and Butler's laws have been the subject of many major histories. Ample evidence of socioeconomic class divisions within the Confederacy provides valuable information. The bibliographies are excellent.

Table of Contents

Introduction	p. 1
Gender Relations and the Development of Union Military Policy
(Mis)Remembering General Order No. 28: Benjamin Butler, the Woman Order, and Historical Memory	p. 17
Bedrooms as Battlefields: The Role of Gender Politics in Sherman's March	p. 33
"Physical Abuse ... and Rough Handling": Race, Gender, and Sexual Justice in the Occupied South	p. 49
Occupied Women and the War at Home
Gettysburg Out of Bounds: Women and Soldiers in the Embattled Borough, 1863	p. 67
"She-Rebels" on the Supply Line: Gender Conventions in Civil War Kentucky	p. 88
"Corresponding with the Enemy": Mobilizing the Relational Field of Battle in St. Louis	p. 103
The Practical Ladies of Occupied Natchez	p. 117
Occupations Within Occupation: Race, Class, and Culture
Between Slavery and Freedom: African American Women and Occupation in the Slave South	p. 137
Occupied at Home: Women Confront Confederate Forces in North Carolina's Quaker Belt	p. 155
Widow in a Swamp: Gender, Unionism, and Literacy in the Occupied South during the Civil War	p. 171
Epilogue: The Fortieth Congress, Southern Women, and the Gender Politics of Postwar Occupation	p. 185
Notes	p. 195
Notes on Contributors	p. 243
Index	p. 247
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.

Excerpts

Near the end of the Civil War, nearly half of the adult male population of the North and a staggering 90 percent of eligible white males in the South had joined the military. With their husbands, sons, and fathers away, legions of women took on additional duties formerly handled by males, and many also faced the ordeal of having homes occupied by enemy troops. With occupation, the home front and the battlefield merged to create an unanticipated second front where civilians-mainly women-resisted what they perceived as illegitimate domination. In Occupied Women, twelve distinguished historians consider how women's reactions to occupation affected both the strategies of military leaders and ultimately the outcome of the Civil War. Contributors include Alecia P. Long, Lisa Tendrich Frank, E. Susan Barber, Charles F. Ritter, Margaret Creighton, Kristen L. Streater, LeeAnn Whites, Cita Cook, Leslie A. Schwalm, Victoria E. Bynum, and Joan E. Cashin. An epilogue by Judith Giesberg concludes the volume. Civil War historians have depicted Confederate women as rendered inert by occupying armies, but these essays demonstrate that women came together to form a strong, localized resistance to military invasion. By broadening the discussion of the Civil War to include what LeeAnn Whites calls the "relational field of battle," this pioneering collection helps reconfigure the location of conflict and the chronology of the American Civil War.