A Soldier's Secret

by Marissa Moss

  After a week cooped up that way, I crave fresh air and enjoy a long stroll along the town’s boardwalk, stopping to treat myself to tea and cakes. I feel the way I did so many years ago when I made my first sales call as Frank Thompson and sweated in my stiff collar, anxious that the lady of the house would see through my disguise. Now I sit at a small round table draped with a lacy tablecloth. Around me cutlery clinks and china cups rattle on their gold-rimmed saucers. I thump down the menu and place my order, no dainty gestures, no simpering smile, just simple and direct.

  “Yes, miss,” the girl in the apron and lace cap says, as if I were a perfectly normal customer, not the bull in a china shop that I feel myself to be.

  When the steaming tea arrives with the gingery cakes, it feels like a minor triumph. I can do this. I’m a woman at last, my own kind of woman. I drink the tea the way I did in the army, noting how the other ladies favor small sips. I munch the pastry like the private I was, wiping crumbs off my mouth with the back of my hand, not dabbing delicately with a napkin like the women around me. And nothing happens. No heads turn to gawk. No fingers point accusingly. Instead, the aproned girl comes back to ask if I want anything else.

  “No.” I smile. “That will be all, thank you.”

  It’s like that each time. No one considers me at all noteworthy. I stroll, run errands, buy things in shops. The more I write about my life, the bolder I become, starting up small conversations with clerks, chatting with the other guests in the boardinghouse. I miss the army, but in my pages I’m with the Second Michigan all over again, and their company gives me the encouragement to be the Sarah I wanted to be before Pa crushed my dreams.

  When I’m finished, I have a slim manuscript, a memoir of my two years in the Army of the Potomac, dedicated to the sick and wounded Union soldiers. Nothing in the memoir describes my disguise or my need for secrecy. It’s the story of a Union nurse and spy and the battles I experienced. I don’t write about Jerome except as a fine fellow nurse. I barely mention James. I describe courageous soldiers and cowards, bloody battle scenes, and exhausting marches. I write about the contraband slaves who freed themselves, and I call for the end of injustice toward Africans. I write of my admiration for General McClellan and my disdain for General Burnside. I write about some of my spying missions and admit, after crossing out the paragraph several times, to shooting the surrendering Southern widow in the hand. I don’t tell about being accused of desertion but instead write that I’ve taken a medical leave. I call myself Sarah now, but I can’t write about myself that way. In the army I was Frank Thompson, a passionately patriotic young man, eager for adventure, and that’s the character I play. Being a woman has nothing to do with my wartime story.

  Now I just have to convince my old employer that Sarah Emma Edmonds was Frank Thompson, his best salesman and the author of the popular dispatches for his newsletter. Then I’ll offer him my thrilling new book to publish.

  Using my army pay tucked neatly into my new lady’s reticule, I buy a train ticket to Connecticut, where my old boss still has his publishing office. Carrying my flower-print satchel instead of my old soldier’s knapsack, I nearly trip over my skirts as I clamber into the carriage. A man in a bowler hat swoops up my bag with a gentlemanly smile before I can protest and heaves it onto the rack over the seat. I have no choice but to thank him, though really I want to scowl and bark at him to keep his hands off my things. Worse yet, he sits next to me and introduces himself, beaming at me with a smile that’s both toothy and oily. It’s a very long train ride.

  Even with my hair grown out and wearing a dress, I figure there will be something familiar about the slim young woman who marches into Mr. Hurlburt’s office at W. S. Williams & Co., Booksellers, in Hartford. I can tell that Mr. Hurlburt recognizes me as someone he’s met before, but he can’t quite place where. I smile, wondering if I should tease him about forgetting my name. He’ll be flustered, sure it’s on the tip of his tongue, but he’ll never guess it.

  “What can I do for you, miss?” he asks.

  “I’m hoping you’ll publish my memoir,” I say, lifting a sheaf of papers from my satchel and setting it down on the counter between us.

  “You look too young to be writing a memoir!” Mr. Hurlburt chortles. “Have you had a particularly interesting life so far?”

  “You might say that.” I lean forward across the counter. “Don’t you recognize me?”

  As I expected, his cheeks turn bright pink. “I’m terrible with names. Pardon me for not remembering yours, though I’m sure we’ve met.” Mr. Hurlburt mumbles nervous excuses, saying he must be getting older, forgetting simple things like that.

  “It’s quite all right,” I say. “After all, it’s been more than two years since we last saw each other. I’m Sarah Emma Edmonds.”

  Mr. Hurlburt shakes his head, wobbling his jowls. “Doesn’t ring a bell, I’m afraid.”

  “It wouldn’t. When you knew me, I was Frank Thompson, your top salesman and army news writer. Now do you remember?”

  “Frank?” My old boss stares at me, mouth open. “My God, Frank, is that really you? You were a woman all along? I don’t believe it!” His eyes boggle as the truth sinks in. “You were in the army? No, that can’t be. It all sounded so real.”

  I grin. “It sounded real because it was. I wrote about what really happened. I was there.”

  Mr. Hurlburt takes off his glasses, wipes the lenses with a kerchief, and perches them back on his nose. He peers at me intently for a long minute.

  “You were a handsome lad, but you’re a much nicer-looking lady! You sure had me fooled! I would’ve sworn on a stack of Bibles that you were a boy—you were my best salesman! The most popular author in the newsletter! We got more mail about you than anyone else!”

  “And now I’ve written you a book,” I say. “You know I left your employ to enlist, and I’ve just spent two years in the Army of the Potomac, working as a nurse and a spy. There are lots of things I didn’t write about for your newsletter, but it’s all here. I’ve had more adventures than some of your wildest serials.”

  Mr. Hurlburt gapes again. “Well, that is a story!” He scans the first few paragraphs. “Hmmm, now, you seem to have left out something vital. Reading this, anyone would think you’re a man.”

  “Everyone thought I was. That’s the way I lived it, so that’s the way I wrote it,” I explain. “It worked for the dispatches. It’ll work for the book.”

  “The newspapers are full of stories these days about women dressed as men fighting in this war, on both sides. There’s a lot of interest in a story like yours.”

  My shoulders tense. It feels like Mr. Hurlburt is trying to take something away from me, the truth as I lived it. No one in the Second Michigan knew I was a woman, except for Jerome—and at the very last minute James. My sex shouldn’t matter in terms of the story I’m telling. Isn’t being a spy exciting enough? Do I have to appeal to prurient interest, to those wondering what kind of unnatural woman would disguise herself as a soldier? I want to publish a solid book, not sensationalist scandal-mongering.

  Mr. Hurlburt strokes his chin, thinking. “I can see you’re set on this, but I have an idea that could please us both. I’ll publish your story, just as it is, but we’ll give it a title that tells the readers what they should know to fully understand the import of your experiences. Let’s call it Unsexed, or The Female Soldier. Now let me read this. Come back tomorrow. We can discuss terms then.”

  I hesitate, then nod. “I’ll see you in the morning.” I turn to go.

  “Sarah!” the bookseller calls after me.

  “Yes?” I pause in the doorway.

  “You still walk like a fellow, you know.”

  “I know!” I bellow back over my shoulder. “And I still wear men’s boots!” I smile all the way back to the hotel. If I can be a published writer, maybe it won’t be so bad being a woman after all. I’ve learned that if I wear the simplest dresses, the ones without corsets and bustles, they aren�
�t horribly confining. They still aren’t easy for riding, but I keep a pair of trousers for that. I’ve faced rifles, cannon, sabers, and bayonets—damned if I’m going to let anyone tell me I can’t wear pants on a horse.

  The next day, Mr. Hurlburt offers to publish my book. I accept some money but ask that all the proceeds from the sales be given to the Sanitary and Christian Commissions for the care of disabled Union veterans. I remember the time at Malvern Hill when I brought food to the hungry troops, how satisfying that was. If the money from my book can feed and house my fellow soldiers, I feel that my deception will be forgiven.

  I pause over the contract, the pen poised in my hand. The last time I signed a legal document was when I enlisted in the Army of the Potomac. I recall vividly that first time I put my name in ink on a page—writing it down made it real, made me Frank Thompson. Now I sign “Sarah Emma Edmonds” with the same flourish. That’s who I am now, I think, that’s me. It isn’t a bad feeling.

  Unsexed, or the Female Soldier becomes an overnight sensation and grows into the national seller I promised, selling more than 175, 000 copies. My story is featured in newspapers. Photos of me in uniform are printed next to ones of me in a dress with my hair grown long and tucked into a bun. Other women’s stories appear in the press, as more female soldiers in disguise are discovered, but as far as I know, I’m the only one who has been more than a soldier—I’ve been a nurse, a spy, a postmaster, and an orderly. I’m proud of the risks I’ve taken, honored to have served with the men of the Second Michigan. Even in a dress, I hold myself with dignity and pride—no sweet modesty for me. I’m Sarah Emma Edmonds, the woman who dressed as a man and fought bravely for the Union, and that is something no one can take away from me, something I will always be proud of.

  ANY YEARS AFTER the Union wins the war, I walk into Damon Stewart’s dry-goods store in Flint, Michigan. Like Mr. Hurlburt, he doesn’t recognize me, but I can see in his eyes that something about my worn face nags at him, familiar despite the gray hair and wrinkles. Of course, his hair is thinner and gray, too, and deep creases fan out from the corners of his eyes, but he looks as good-natured as ever.

  “Can I help you, ma’am?” Damon asks.

  “I believe you can.” I smile. “Damon, you haven’t changed a bit! It’s good to see you—and you’re doing so well, with your own store and everything!”

  Damon scratches his head, puzzled. “I can see that you know me, ma’am, but I can’t say I know you. Remind me where we met. And when.”

  “Well, it was nineteen years ago, so you can be forgiven for not remembering, but we spent a lot of time together then. In fact, we shared a tent for near two years.” I pause. “I was Frank Thompson.”

  “Frank!” Damon goggles. “You’re really Frank? I mean, you were Frank? I mean, he was you? Frank was a woman?”

  “Didn’t you call me your little woman?” I tease.

  “But we didn’t mean it!” Damon’s mouth opens and shuts like a fish gasping for air, trying to make sense out of the incomprehensible.

  “You always wondered why I didn’t have a sweetheart. Now do you understand?”

  Damon plops down heavily on the stool behind the counter and wipes his brow. “Just give me a minute, now. This is a lot to reckon with. If you were really Frank, you’ve got to prove it to me somehow.”

  “I could tell the story about how your leg wasn’t amputated. Or the one about the nasty Rebel horse I gave to the chaplain. Or when General Kearney presented me with a Confederate sword.”

  “Glory be!” Damon holds up a hand. “I believe you—you must be Frank. You sure look like him—or at any road, his sister! What happened to you? I heard you deserted. I couldn’t believe it.”

  “I didn’t mean to. Do you have time for a visit now? I’ll explain everything.”

  Damon nods. “Of course, sit down.” He blushes just the way I remember him doing so many years ago. “You know I got married. To Virginia. I felt so bad about it, I couldn’t tell you.”

  “To Virginia?” I hoot. “No wonder her letters got so cold and boring after you went home! I should have figured it out.”

  “It wasn’t like that, really—I wouldn’t have stolen her from you.” Damon’s cheeks are even pinker. “She said that things just weren’t that way with you.”

  “Of course not,” I agree. “But what about Polly? I thought she was your true love.”

  “I thought so too, but she up and married some other feller. Didn’t even have the decency to send me a ‘Sorry, Sweetheart’ letter! That left me commiserating with her cousin, Virginia, and well …”

  I reach over and put my hand on Damon’s arm. “It’s fine. I’m happy you two found each other. Obviously nothing could ever have happened between Virginia and me.”

  “Now I see that, but I felt so guilty about it, I could barely write you. Nor could she.”

  That explains all the talk of farming in Damon’s letters and not much else. I thought he was just a poor writer, not someone hiding his own secret.

  “Any children?” I ask.

  Damon nods. “I have three strapping sons and one sweet daughter.”

  “I’m delighted to hear it, Damon. You deserve a fine family. And so does Virginia.”

  We pass the rest of the afternoon catching up on the last nineteen years. Damon left the farm after his marriage, taking over his father-in-law’s store. It’s a good, simple life. Whenever it rains, his leg and arm ache, reminding him of the old wounds, but the war seems like something that happened a lifetime ago. He knows he’s one of the lucky ones, coming home with all his hands and legs, both eyes, no horrific scars.

  I in turn explain why I left camp, how I tried to return but had already been branded a deserter. I sketch in the next years: writing the memoir, then the last years of the war working as a battlefield nurse—a woman this time-then going to college. After peace was declared, I moved to Louisiana to manage a home for the children of slaves whose parents had been killed in the Civil War, but the climate there was too hard on me—the old bouts of swamp fever grew more and more frequent until I had to move away. I finally settled in Kansas, where I live now, working on my old dream of building a home for disabled veterans.

  “What about a family?” asks Damon. “Did you ever find that sweetheart you were looking for? I mean, a feller.” He blushes again.

  I smile sadly. “I did. I married a kind, good man who knew me when I was a girl back in Canada. Linus Seelye didn’t mind that I wore men’s boots and was better with a gun than he was. We had three children.” I sigh. “The two boys didn’t make it to a year. The girl died before she was six. The sorrow killed my husband.”

  “That’s a heap of grieving,” Damon says. We’re both quiet, remembering all the people we’ve known who have died. Damon gently cups his hand over mine. “What brings you here now? Are you moving back to Flint?”

  “No.” I straighten my back and look levelly at my old tentmate. “I’m here because I need your help.”

  “For the feller who saved my leg, anything!”

  “As far as the U.S. government is concerned, Frank Thompson deserted. I want to clear my name. It’s been eating at me all this time that people think I was a coward. I’m applying for an honorable discharge and a pension as a legitimate veteran. For that I need affidavits from the soldiers who fought with me, attesting to my bravery and that Frank Thompson and Sarah Emma Edmonds are the same person.”

  Damon grins. “You deserve that, Frank, I mean, Miss Edmonds. I mean, Mrs. Seelye. I’ll write to everyone I know—we’ll get you that honorable discharge and the pension, too.”

  Damon is as good as his word. In my clapboard Kansas farmhouse I receive copies of the letters pouring into Congress from men in the Second Michigan. Doctors, nurses, General Poe, even James Reid sends an affidavit from Scotland, though he doesn’t admit to ever knowing that Frank Thompson was a woman, a consideration I deeply appreciate. Other soldiers write that they heard rumors that Frank was real
ly a female after I deserted. In fact, my abrupt departure was explained as a love story—supposedly I was following my tentmate, James Reid. We were said to be lovers, and when he left, I naturally followed. Reading those letters alone at the kitchen table, my cheeks flame red. I had no idea I was the subject of such vile gossip. I remember that last parting kiss with James and feel as horribly ashamed as I did when it happened. I never wanted to kiss him. We were friends, no more. How could people believe otherwise?

  “It was idle talk, that’s all, Sarah,” Damon reassures me. We’ve rekindled our friendship, and I often go to see him. It’s a long train trip and every penny matters, but I can’t stay away long. It means a lot to have someone to talk with about those years. It keeps them alive for me, reminding me of who I’d been and what I’d done.

  Of all the men who write in my support, testifying to my bravery, the one who matters most is silent. Damon says he doesn’t know where Jerome ended up—the veterans of the Army of the Potomac have lost track of him.

  The overwhelming goodwill behind the letters convinces Congress and President Chester Alan Arthur. It takes two years, but in the spring of 1884 two different congressional acts are passed, the first recognizing Sarah Emma Edmonds Seelye as Frank Thompson of the Second Michigan and granting me an honorable discharge and back pay. The second act grants me a pension as the only recognized female veteran of the War Between the States.

  That bill reads in part:

  Truth is ofttimes stranger than fiction, and now comes the sequel. Sarah E. E. Seelye, alias Franklin Thompson, is now asking this Congress to grant her relief by way of a pension on account of fading health, which she avers had its incurrence and is the consequence of the days and nights she spent in the swamps of the Chickahominy in the days she spent soldiering.

  That Franklin Thompson and Sarah E. E. Seelye are one and the same person is established by abundance of proof and beyond a doubt.

  When I get the news in an official telegram, I rush to take the first train to Flint, eager to share my triumph with Damon. I spend my last twenty dollars on the round-trip ticket, but now that I have a pension coming, I don’t care.