History Commons^™

Dead Broets Society: Masculinity In Walt Whitman’S War Verse, Anika N. Jensen

The Gettysburg Compiler: On the Front Lines of History

There are two images of masculinity in Walt Whitman’s Drum-Taps, his collection of wartime poetry: one, the strong, hardened soldier, the image of manliness, and the other the boyish, rosy-cheeked recruit. Whitman’s sexuality, while not the Victorian social norm, was no secret, and he wrote openly of the hospitalized soldiers during his time as a Union nurse with admiration, affection, and love. Some critics, such as Thomas Wentworth Higginson, castigated Whitman’s queer themes to be overwhelming, distractingly sensual, and "unmanly," while others, like William Sloane Kennedy, dissented, arguing instead that the overt sexuality present in Whitman’s work was precisely …

Ready, Aim, Feminism: When Women Went Off To War, Anika N. Jensen

The Gettysburg Compiler: On the Front Lines of History

I like to imagine that if Sarah Emma Edmonds were my contemporary she would often sport a t-shirt saying, "This is what a feminist looks like."

Edmonds was a patriot, a feminist, and, along with an estimated 400 other women, a soldier in the American Civil War. Fed up with her father’s abuse and appalled at the prospect of an arranged marriage Edmonds left her New Brunswick home at the age of fifteen and soon adopted a male identity to become a successful worker. When the war erupted, she was compelled by a sense of patriotism and adventure to join …

A Woman In Soldier’S Dress: Then And Now, Elizabeth A. Smith

The Gettysburg Compiler: On the Front Lines of History

This post is the second in a three-part series on women soldiers in the Civil War and during modern reenactments. Also check out the introduction of this series.

I was thirteen years old when I joined the 5^th Kentucky Orphan Brigade, a Confederate reenactment group based out of south-central Kentucky. At fourteen, I “saw the elephant”—a Civil War term for seeing battle—for the first time as a soldier. It was the most terrifying thing I’ve ever done, but seven years later I credit that decision to go through with it as bringing me to where I am now, …

A Woman In Soldier’S Dress: Taking The Field, Elizabeth A. Smith

The Gettysburg Compiler: On the Front Lines of History

The year was 1989. The place, a Civil War reenactment at Antietam National Battlefield. Lauren Cook (then Burgess) had been participating in reenactments for two years. Her portrayal of a fifer required her to wear a soldier’s uniform rather than in a civilian woman’s dress. She did her best to portray a soldier, disguising her sex so she could pass the “fifteen yard” rule, which meant that at fifteen yards she could not be identified as a woman. The call of nature proved to be her undoing, however, when an NPS official “caught” her coming out of the women’s restroom. …

Finally Speaking Up: Sexual Assault In The Civil War Era, Anika N. Jensen

The Gettysburg Compiler: On the Front Lines of History

Trigger warning: This article contains detail concerning rape and sexual assault.

On March 12, 1864, in the midst of a bloody war which had long overflowed its thimble, Margaret Brooks was returning from her home near Memphis, Tennessee when her wagon broke down in Nonconnah Creek. Not long after her driver left to find help, three rambunctious New Jersey cavalrymen, all white, approached Brooks, demanding her money. She was then raped multiple times at gunpoint [excerpt].

The Unfinished Work: Slavery Today, Kevin P. Lavery

The Gettysburg Compiler: On the Front Lines of History

2.7 million. That’s an estimate for the number of slaves in the world today. The true number is probably higher, even though the United States abolished slavery 150 years ago. Most of today’s slaves go unseen and unaided, victims of an opaque system of exploitation that conspires to keep them oppressed. [excerpt]