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Full-Text Articles in History
Bureaus Of Ungentlemanly Warfare: Comparing The Roles Of Women In The Special Operations Executive And The Office Of Strategic Services During World War Ii, Adaline Nolley
Senior Honors Theses
In 1940, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill created the Special Operations Executive. The SOE was one of the first government agencies to recruit female spies. In 1941, United States President Franklin Roosevelt commissioned the Office of Strategic Services, which also employed women. The organizations approached the concept of female agents differently. The OSS maintained female staff in domestic offices, but employed foreign women as agents. The SOE recruited women to go abroad, as they were less suspicious than men in occupied territories. The study of female staff in the OSS and the SOE allow historians to understand roles of women …
The Perfect Vessel Of Grief: Women And Mourning Photography, Savannah Labbe
The Perfect Vessel Of Grief: Women And Mourning Photography, Savannah Labbe
The Gettysburg Compiler: On the Front Lines of History
After her father died, the girl in the photo above went through a highly ritualized and formalized process of Victorian mourning. This process radically changed with the invention of photography in 1839. Now one could record the grieving process, which is what the photograph above accomplished. The photograph is a typical mourning portrait, depicting the mourner (the little girl in this case), with the photo of her deceased loved one in her hands. Like so many other photographs, this one recorded the grieving process, allowing loved ones to keep a piece of that person even after their death. 19th-century photographs …
Visual Culture Project: Confederate War Etchings: Searching For Arms By Adalbert Johann Volck, Lynn B. Hatcher
Visual Culture Project: Confederate War Etchings: Searching For Arms By Adalbert Johann Volck, Lynn B. Hatcher
Student Publications
Adalbert Johann Volck’s 1861 sketch of Union soldiers, “Searching for Arms,” represents a substantial contribution to the narrative about gender relations during the American Civil War. This simple, small sketch offers the observer a window into the past. It is a collision of symbols and meaning—from gender to war to the household—all wrapped up in one image. This is a portrait sketch of a woman being invaded in her domestic, private sphere, revealing so much about gender relations during the time. The mistress herself seemed to embody a vast range of sentiments such as anger, fear, frailty, and strength, proving …
Beneath The Mulberry Tree: Sarah Edmonds And Women In Memory, Anika N. Jensen
Beneath The Mulberry Tree: Sarah Edmonds And Women In Memory, Anika N. Jensen
The Gettysburg Compiler: On the Front Lines of History
In her memoir Nurse and Spy in the Union Army, Sarah Emma Edmonds, a woman fighting in the Union Army disguised as a man, employed florid diction and a subtle romantic flare to illustrate an emotional and confounding moment in the aftermath of the Battle of Antietam: discovering another woman undercover. Edmonds writes of the “pale, sweet face of a youthful soldier,” of a boy trembling from blood loss who, she knew, had only a few more minutes on earth. He tasted his last sip of water, and with his remaining breaths the soldier beckoned Edmonds closer and uttered a …
Women And World War Ii At Gettysburg College, Keira B. Koch
Women And World War Ii At Gettysburg College, Keira B. Koch
Student Publications
An examination of the women attending Gettysburg College during World War II. This project examined what the women did and experienced during the World War II, along with analyzing campus culture and life.
Call To Duty: Women And World War I, Jennifer D. Keene
Call To Duty: Women And World War I, Jennifer D. Keene
History Faculty Articles and Research
"Watching loved ones depart, uncertain if they would return—this was an experience that women around the world shared during the Great War. The continual scene of women sending men off to fight was troubling; paradoxically, it was also a familiar, traditional ritual that reinforced gender roles within western societies. "
Shepherd, Katherine A. (Sc 1156), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
Shepherd, Katherine A. (Sc 1156), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
MSS Finding Aids
Finding aid only for Manuscripts Small Collection 1156. Desert Storm letters (14) written by different servicemen to Katherine Shepherd, Campbellsville, Kentucky, who was preparing a presentation for the Campbellsville Junior High School about the service in the Persian Gulf War. Letters answer specific questions asked by Shepherd.
Coombs Family Collection (Mss 349), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
Coombs Family Collection (Mss 349), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
MSS Finding Aids
Finding aid for Manuscripts Collection 349. Correspondence, photographs, business records and miscellaneous papers of the Coombs, Robertson and related families of Warren and Simpson counties in Kentucky and of Alabama, Texas and Tennessee. Includes correspondence, personal papers and research of Elizabeth Robertson Coombs, librarian at the Kentucky Library, Western Kentucky University. Several documents from this collection have been scanned are available for viewing by clicking on the "Additional Files" below.
Selby, Cornelia Frances, 1916-2005 (Sc 2530), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
Selby, Cornelia Frances, 1916-2005 (Sc 2530), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
MSS Finding Aids
Finding aid and scans (Click on "Additional Files" below) for Manuscripts Small Collection 2530. Letters from Cornelia Frances “Fran” Selby to her sister, Mary Agnes Selby in Utica, Ohio, written during Cornelia’s service in the Women’s Army Corps at Camp Campbell, Kentucky. She writes of her activities, her anticipated furlough and their male acquaintances.
Perguson, Dee Carl, Jr., 1921-2010 (Mss 8), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
Perguson, Dee Carl, Jr., 1921-2010 (Mss 8), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
MSS Finding Aids
Finding aid only for Manuscripts Collection 8. Correspondence and diaries of Deel Carl Perguson, Jr., Horse Branch (Ohio County), Kentucky, and Seattle, Washington. Of interest are his letters written while serving in World War II in the United States, North Africa, and Italy, and his later memoirs of this period. Also of interest are diaries of his years as a student at Western Kentucky State Teachers College, 1939-1943. The collection also includes his recollections of growing up in Horse Branch in the 1920s and 1930s.
Hoffman, Mary Elizabeth - Relating To (Sc 667), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
Hoffman, Mary Elizabeth - Relating To (Sc 667), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
MSS Finding Aids
Finding aid and scan (Click on "additional files" below) for Manuscripts Small Collection 667. Anonymous, undated essay entitled “Incidents in the Life of Mrs. M. E. Hoffman of Cynthiana, Ky.” describing the Civil War activities of Mrs. Hoffman, a Confederate sympathizer. Includes a 1970s letter to Nancy Disher Baird giving additional information on Mrs. Hoffman’s actions during the Civil War.
Spiller, Mary Jane (Singletary), 1841-1939 (Sc 2448), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
Spiller, Mary Jane (Singletary), 1841-1939 (Sc 2448), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
MSS Finding Aids
Finding aid and full-text scan for Manuscripts Small Collection 2448. Typescripted memoir by Mary Jane Singletary of her Civil War experiences in Louisiana. She provides data about her family's military service, their efforts to evade Union blockades of Baton Rouge, and of protecting their possessions from Union troops. Also includes a reminiscence of Elise Talmage Lieb which mentions Spiller and a photograph of Spiller.
World War Ii, 1939-1945 - Letters (Mss 330), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
World War Ii, 1939-1945 - Letters (Mss 330), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
MSS Finding Aids
Finding aid only for Manuscripts Collection 330. Letters written to parents, friends, faculty and staff of Western Kentucky University by students during their service in Word War II. Includes some press releases, newspaper articles and photos. Also includes a history and travel log of the USS Stevens.
Warren County, Kentucky - World War Ii Servicemen (Mss 326), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
Warren County, Kentucky - World War Ii Servicemen (Mss 326), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
MSS Finding Aids
Finding aid only for Manuscripts Collection 326. Data and newspaper clippings on U.S. military personnel from Warren County, collected during their service in World War II. The seventy pages of names includes women and African Americans.
Cisney, Barbara (Sc 2252), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
Cisney, Barbara (Sc 2252), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
MSS Finding Aids
Finding aid only for Manuscripts Small Collection 2252. "Bevie W. Cain," and "Civil War Letters of Bevie Cain," two papers written by Barbara Cisney for Western Kentucky University history classes and based primarily on a collection of Cain's letters held in WKU's Special Collections Library (SC 2251).
Cain, Bevie Waughn, 1844-1883 (Sc 2251), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
Cain, Bevie Waughn, 1844-1883 (Sc 2251), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
MSS Finding Aids
Finding aid and typescripts (Click on "Additional Files" below) for Manuscripts Small Collection 2251. Letters (31) from Cain to James M. Davis, written mostly during the Civil War from her home and school in Breckinridge County, Kentucky, and from Illinois. A strong Confederate sympathizer, Cain responds to Davis’s support of the Union, criticizes President Abraham Lincoln, and opines freely on love, courtship and marriage. She also writes of mutual friends, family, and social and religious activities. Includes 3 additional letters to Davis from his father, sister, and a friend who writes of an opportunity to manage a store. Also includes …
Schiess, Nancy (Sc 2062), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
Schiess, Nancy (Sc 2062), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
MSS Finding Aids
Finding aid only for Manuscripts Small Collection 2062. Paper: "Influences On and Decision Factors of Women Entering World War II from Western Kentucky State Teachers College" written by Nancy Schiess for a Kentucky history course at Western Kentucky University.
Fishburn, Myra Jane, B. 1970 (Mss 280), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
Fishburn, Myra Jane, B. 1970 (Mss 280), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
MSS Finding Aids
Finding aid only for Manuscripts Collection 280. Correspondence of Myra Jane Fishburn during her service in the Iraq War with the 76th U.S. Army Band. Includes photographs, Arabic language instruction materials, Arabic music CDs, and miscellaneous training and informational materials.
Covert, Craig H., B. 1965 (Sc 1990), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
Covert, Craig H., B. 1965 (Sc 1990), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
MSS Finding Aids
Finding aid only for Manuscripts Small Collection 1990. Correspondence of Craig H. Covert while serving in Iraq War from January to May 2004. As a member of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) Close Protection Team based in Basra, Iraq, Covert provided protective support to CPA South Administrator Patrick M. Nixon.
Dulaney Family (Sc 1466), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
Dulaney Family (Sc 1466), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
MSS Finding Aids
Finding aid for Manuscripts Small Collection 1466. Letter, December 1855, written from Annie E. Dulaney to her brother, William L. Dulaney, in which she discusses her schoolwork and the approaching Christmas holiday. Also included (Click on "Additional Files" below for scan) is a sketch (1909) of Hiram W. Dulaney's service in the 9th Regiment Kentucky Cavalry (C.S.A) during the Civil War.
Torreyson, Charles Hail, 1902-1973 (Sc 1340), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
Torreyson, Charles Hail, 1902-1973 (Sc 1340), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
MSS Finding Aids
Finding aid only for Manuscripts Small Collection 1340. World War II letters, 1944-1945, (27) written by Charles Torreyson to his wife Betsy, in Scottsville, Kentucky. He describes life in the Seabees, in Camp Pearcy, Virginia, and in New Guinea.