Forgetting the Women: Debates over Female Patriotism in the Aftermath of America's Civil War

Abstract

Northern women were mobilized in unprecedented numbers during America's Civil War. In its aftermath, it looked like their efforts would be celebrated long into the future, a possibility signaled by the publication of Frank Moore's Women of the War in 1866. Instead, this unique flourishing of female volunteerism was largely forgotten by the turn of the century. This article explains this erasure by analyzing the letters women sent to Moore as he set about memorializing their war work. It demonstrates that women were deeply divided over how to articulate an ideal of patriotic womanhood, and these divisions undermined their ability to advance a coherent story about their efforts. Moreover, most adhered to a standard of humility that worked against remembering women's wartime participation. As a result, memories of the Civil War quickly came to focus solely on the battlefield.