Women Soldiers  "A Brave Deceit"

In 1934, near the Shiloh battlefield, a mass grave was discovered to contained the bones of nine Union soldiers killed in that 1862 battle. One of the bodies was that of a woman.. No one knows how many women served as soldiers in the Civil War, but it is estimated that no fewer than 400 disguised themselves as men and performed the same duties as any soldier. Any woman in the ranks of either army would have been banished once detected, but some served as soldiers without their sex ever being known.

Albert J. Cashier enlisted in Company G, 95th Illinois, in September 1862, and served in the Vicksburg and Red River campaigns, fought at Nashville, and at the war's end was mustered out with the rest of his regiment. After a routine medical exam, he filed for a pension in 1899. It was only when he was sent to a hospital after a 1911 automobile accident that it was discovered that "he" was a woman. The old members of her company said they never suspected that fact and that she had performed in camp and battle just as all the rest of the unit had.

Florena Budwin disguised herself as a man and joined the Union army with her husband. They were both captured and sent to Andersonville prison in Georgia, where her husband died. After Union forces moved into Georgia, Florena was transferred to the Confederate prison at Florence, SC., where she became very ill. After a doctor discovered her sex, she was given a private room and special care, but to no avail. She died in prison on January 25, 1865.

Kady Brownell did not disguise herself, but she accompanied her husband into the Union army, performing camp chores for the regiment. She supposedly carried a rifle and a flag at the Battle of 1st Bull Run.

A girl known only as Emily disguised herself and enlisted in a Michigan regiment as a drummer. Only after she received a fatal wound in the Battle of Chickamauga was her sex discovered.

Fascinating Fact:  Sometimes prostitutes would disguise themselves as soldiers to gain entry into the camps for a few lucrative days' work, but they were never known to have performed soldiers' duties.


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