Women in the Civil War

by Larry G. Eggleston

  In May 1861, one of her close friends, Captain Thomas Jordan, who was a quartermaster in the Union army, stopped at her home to say goodbye. He was resigning his commission and leaving Washington to join General Beauregard’s Confederate troops. Rose confided in Captain Jordan that she wanted to help the Confederacy but didn’t know what she could do. Jordan and Rose began planning an espionage ring to gather vital information and pass it along to General Beauregard. The ring included army Colonel Michael Thompson, who was based in Washington; William T. Smithson, a Washington banker; Dr. Aaron Van Camp, Rose’s personal dentist; an unmarried woman named Bettie Hassler; and 14-year-old Betty Duvall, a close friend to Rose.

  Captain Jordan developed a crude code for Rose to use when writing messages. The coded messages were to be carried on tissue paper rolled up in hair curlers or in women’s undergarments since searching a lady was considered improper conduct during the 19th century. Rose carried the code in her camisole at all times.

  Once the lines of communication to General Beauregard were established, Captain Jordan left Washington to join the Confederate troops. He was later appointed Adjutant General of the Confederate Army at Manassas.

  Rose Greenhow first applied her espionage talents on Colonel E.D. Keys, secretary to General Winfield Scott, General-in-Chief of the Union army, and Senator Wilson of Massachusetts. The information she obtained from these two sources gave her the following list of information on the upcoming Battle of First Manassas/Bull Run, which she forwarded to General Pierre Beauregard.

  1. The Union forces would leave Washington on July 16 to advance toward Richmond.

  2. The Union troops would consist of 50,000 men.

  3. They would advance through Arlington, Alexandria, and Centerville to Manassas.

  4. The Union would cut the Winchester Railroad line to prevent General Joseph Johnston from coming to the aid of General Beauregard.

  Accompanying this information was a copy of General McDowell’s actual orders to his troops. This was the first message Rose sent to General Beauregard. The message was sent on July 10, 1861, by courier. The message was coded and carried by Rose’s good friend, 14-year-old Betty Duvall, rolled up in her hair. Betty posed as a market girl driving a cart. This message gave General Beauregard the time he needed to ready his troops and General Johnston’s army the time to march from the Shenandoah Valley to reach Manassas and reinforce the Confederate troops. General Beauregard was better prepared for the Federal assault, since he now knew where it was to take place. This advantage led to a Southern victory at First Manassas/Bull Run.

  On July 21, 1861, Thomas Jordan delivered a message to Rose from General Jackson. The message read “Our president and our general direct me to thank you. We rely upon you for further information. The Confederacy owes you a debt.” Later in her life, President Jefferson Davis would thank her in person.

  Rose continued gathering and sending information to General Beauregard; she was becoming quite talented in the espionage business. She later wrote of her success, “To this end I employed every capacity with which God endowed me, and the result was more successful than my hopes could have flattered me to believe.”

  As prisoners of war were being brought into Washington, the federal government took over the old Capitol Building and converted it into a prison. This was previously the boarding house where Rose lived with her aunt. Rose began to visit the Confederate soldiers imprisoned there under the guise of bringing them food and medicine. While visiting the prisoners she was able to gather information from them on troop movements, troop emplacements and their strengths. They passed through Federal lines on their way to prison in Washington and had such knowledge.

  Rose was not initially suspected of any other motive for visiting the prisoners than bringing them food and medicine since her sympathy for the southern cause was no secret, but because she had previously been under suspicion due to her outspoken views, her visits to the prison were noted. She was kept under constant surveillance although no espionage activity could be discovered on her part. When her social friends urged her to stop any activity she might be engaged in, she simply replied, “The devil is no match for a clever woman.” She continued her espionage activities even though she was under constant surveillance by Pinkerton’s Federal Detective Bureau.

  On August 23, 1861, upon returning home, she noticed several men at her door. She remarked to one of her operatives as she walked past, “I think I am about to be arrested.” Rose was indeed arrested and placed under house arrest. She was charged with communicating with the enemy in the South. Federal troops had found maps, plans, and messages Rose had sent to the Confederate troops. These items were carelessly left behind during a hasty Confederate withdrawal from Fairfax Courthouse. The code used by Rose was quickly broken and considered an amateurish attempt at code.

  In her book My Imprisonment and the First Year of Abolition Rule in Washington, which was published in London in 1863, she stated that her reply to the charges made against her was

  If it were an established fact, you could not be surprised by it, I am after all a Southern woman, and I thank God that no drop of Yankee blood ever polluted my veins. All of whom I have honored and respected have been driven to seek shelter in the South. It would seem the most natural thing that I should communicate with them.

  The initial search of her home after her arrest found nothing. She had, however, written records of her espionage ring concealed in the pages of books on the top shelf of her library. She feared that a second search would uncover the records, as well as a message she had ready for General Beauregard. She quickly began working on the detective who was guarding her. She bribed him with brandy to let her go into her library alone. Once inside, she burned the records in the stove and concealed the message meant for General Beauregard in her stockings. Betty Hassler, while visiting Rose, took the message and the next day delivered it to General Beauregard.

  At Rose’s house her arrest continued; the home became known as Fort Greenhow. Several other women under house arrest were also placed there. Even with all the security of a prison, Rose continued to send messages out. The Pinkerton Detectives could not figure out how she got the messages past their security. She was under constant surveillance even when she slept; her door was left open and a guard kept an eye on her.

  Finally, one of her messages was intercepted and published in the newspaper. This embarrassment to the federal government prompted them to close Fort Greenhow and transfer all the women to Old Capitol Prison on January 18, 1862. Rose and her daughter, “Little Rose,” were placed in a room on the second floor overlooking the courtyard.

  On March 25, 1862, she appeared before the United States commissioners for the trial of state prisoners to answer the charges against her. Judge Peirrepont and General Dix, a close friend of Rose’s, headed the inquiry. The outcome of the hearing was that Rose would be exiled to the South.

  On May 31, 1862, word came to Rose that she was to be transferred to Fortress Monroe and then to the Southern Confederacy. On the morning of June 4, 1862, she and Little Rose were set ashore at City Point by a boat from the Monitor. From there, Confederate officers escorted them to Richmond. That evening, President Jefferson Davis called on her to personally thank her for her service to the Confederacy. He told her, “But for you there would have been no Battle of Bull Run.”

  Rose was well received in Richmond and was soon enjoying a rich social life. She still wanted to do something to help the Confederate cause and was offered $2,500 to travel to Europe and act as an agent for the Confederacy. She traveled with Little Rose to Charleston where she met with General Beauregard. Several weeks passed and she told her social acquaintances that she planned to go to Europe and enroll Little Rose in the Convent of the Sacred Heart in Paris. Late one night they set sail on a blockade-runner from Charleston to Bermuda and then on to England.

  Rose was very successful in Europe in her mission to gain support for the Confederacy. When she arrived
in England she was presented to Queen Victoria. Later, upon her visit to France, she was given a private audience with Napoleon III. It was in England that she wrote of her experiences in My Imprisonment or the First Year of Abolition Rule in Washington. The book was an instant success and gained much sympathy and support for the Confederacy.

  Rose enjoyed her social life in England. She became betrothed to a prominent Englishman and planned to remarry and stay in England. For some reason, though, Rose left England suddenly, and left her daughter in the Convent of the Sacred Heart in Paris. She boarded the Condor, which was a new three-funneled steamer on its first trip as a blockade-runner. Delaying her plans to marry and risking her life to return to the Confederacy are strong indications that she carried some very important information or plans for the Southern cause.

  The captain of the Condor was an English officer named Captain Augustus Charles Hobart-Hampton who was on a one year leave and was blockade running for adventure. The Condor slipped through the blockade and approached the North Carolina coast at Cape Fear. When it was almost to the mouth of the river, about 200 yards from shore, the Condor spotted a vessel straight ahead. Thinking it was one of the Federal squadron, they swerved the ship sharply and ran aground on New Inlet Bar.

  The other ship turned out to be another blockade-runner, the Nighthawk, which had been run down by the Federal blockade the previous night.

  Rose O’Neal Greenhow and “Little Rose” at Old Capitol Prison. Courtesy of Leib Image Archives.

  It was almost dawn and, fearing discovery by Union gunboats, the captain dived overboard and swam to shore. Rose and two other Confederate agents, Judge Holcombe and Lieutenant Wilson, demanded to be taken ashore. They were placed in a boat and headed for shore, but the rough waters soon capsized the boat and the two men swam to shore after losing sight of Rose. (There is a conflicting report that Admiral Hewitt, who had been knighted by Queen Victoria as Ambassador to Abyssinia, put Rose into a boat at Cape Fear.) Rose was dragged down by the $2,000 in gold coin she had tied to her waist for safekeeping. She drowned on September 30, 1864.

  Early the next morning a Confederate soldier walking near the beach discovered the body of a woman that had washed ashore. He discovered the gold around her waist and took it. He then shoved the body back into the surf. Later that day the body was rediscovered by other Confederate troops who recognized it as that of Rose Greenhow. After finding out who the dead woman was, the soldier who took the gold felt so bad he returned it and joined the mourners.

  Her body was placed in the State Capitol at Richmond for public homage. Rose was buried with full military honors on October 1, 1864. Her coffin was draped with the Confederate flag and buried in Oakdale Cemetery in Wilmington, North Carolina. Her grave has a marble cross with the words “Mrs. Rose O’Neal Greenhow, a bearer of dispatches to the Confederate Government.”

  Every year on the anniversary of her death, the Daughters of the Confederacy place a wreath on her grave. Rose O’Neal Greenhow was an extraordinary woman whose sacrifices and courage made an important impact on the cause in which she believed. Presidents, queens and kings were awed by her character and daring.

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  Maria Isabella Boyd: Confederate Spy

  She was such a notorious Confederate spy that the Union newspapers labeled her “The Siren of the Shenandoah” and “The Rebel Joan of Arc.” Her service to Stonewall Jackson was invaluable in his Shenandoah Valley campaign. She was 17-year-old Maria Isabella “Belle” Boyd.

  Belle Boyd was born May 9, 1844, in the town of Martinsburg, Virginia. She was the daughter of a shopkeeper. The family was not wealthy but enjoyed a comfortable life. Belle, as a young Southern girl, developed a deep loyalty for the South. This love of the Southern way of life would manifest itself in her determination to serve the Confederacy during the Civil War.

  Martinsburg, Virginia, was a small town located in the northwestern part of Virginia. On April 17, 1861, when Virginia voted on secession, the Loyalist leaders of the western section of the state refused to accept the vote. They then held three conventions from May to August for the purpose of electing a Loyalist state governor and electing their own Senators. They voted to combine the 50 western counties into the state of West Virginia and petition the federal government for statehood. They were finally granted statehood by a proclamation signed by President Lincoln on June 20, 1863. West Virginia was the 35th state in the Union.

  Martinsburg was now in West Virginia and part of the Union. However, the 26 months it took to become a state were marked with occupation by Federal troops and treatment of the population as if they were the enemy. Federal troops occupied Martinsburg on July 3, 1861. The area was a mixture of loyalists and southern sympathizers.

  Belle was just 17 years old when Federal troops occupied Martinsburg. On the second day of occupation, July 4, 1861, several soldiers became intoxicated and went on a rampage which included shooting out windows, destroying public property, invading homes, destroying personal property, and using loud and offensive language toward the townspeople.

  These drunken soldiers had previously heard a rumor that Belle Boyd had decorated her room with Confederate flags. They stormed her home in search of these flags but found nothing. Belle’s loyal maid Eliza had quickly gathered the flags and burned them as the soldiers approached the house. The soldiers then decided to raise the Union flag over the Boyd home to indicate submission to the North.

  When Mrs. Boyd objected to the Union flag being raised over her home, she was met with a barrage of insults and foul language. Seeing her mother being insulted by the drunken Yankees was more than Belle could bear. She drew out her Derringer and shot the insulting soldier. He was carried out by his comrades and soon died from the wound.

  Word quickly spread that a Southern belle had killed a Union soldier. The news almost caused a riot among the occupying Union troops. Several soldiers began preparations to burn the Boyd home, with the occupants still inside. Fearing for their lives, Belle fashioned a handwritten note to the commanding officer of the Federal forces, asking that he intervene and stop the soldiers from burning their home. The message reached the commanding officer in time and the riot was stopped. The commanding officer and his staff then held an inquiry into the incident. They questioned all witnesses and came to the conclusion that Belle had acted properly under the circumstances. He then placed guards around the house to stop any further incidents from occurring.

  The commanding officer’s decision was the result of many factors. He was well aware of the fact that the area did not support the Virginia vote on secession, and he realized that his men were out of line in their actions. But most important to him was ethics, which dictated that it was not chivalrous to take stern measures against someone of the weaker sex, regardless what offense was committed.

  Belle got to know the guards and soon found out how easy it was to extract information from them, which she could forward to the Confederate authorities. Thus began her career as a Confederate spy. She began to send messages to the Confederate leaders by using her friends and her faithful maid Eliza. Both Negro and white couriers were used. She developed several ways of hiding the messages such as sewing them into the soles of shoes, packing them inside loaves of bread, in hollowed-out fruit and in the heads of dolls, and writing them on eggs which could only be read by holding them up to a coal oil lamp.

  By the time First Manassas/Bull Run was being fought, Belle had left Martinsburg and was staying with relatives at 101 Chester Street, Front Royal, Virginia. She gained employment in the local hospital but longed for a job as a courier for the Confederacy. By October 1861, she was appointed a courier for General Beauregard. She also provided information to General Thomas (Stonewall) Jackson during the 1862 Shenandoah Valley campaign.

  Front Royal being occupied by Federal troops gave Belle an easy source for information. She initially did not use a code in her messages but wrote them out and signed them. This amateur practice got her in trouble agai
n when one of her messages were intercepted. In early 1862, she was arrested on suspicion of spying and taken to Baltimore. She was released after a week of courteous imprisonment. She was told to stop her activities because they were treasonous. Here again, chivalry came to her rescue. She was released and returned to Front Royal where she immediately continued her spying activities.

  Union officers frequently used the rooming house in Front Royal. This offered her yet another opportunity to gather information vital to the Confederacy. She would listen at doors, through walls, through knotholes, and hide in closets to gather information to forward to the Confederacy.

  On May 23, 1862, Stonewall Jackson planned to recapture the town of Front Royal as part of his drive against General Banks’ Union forces. Information from many sources reached Belle concerning the Union plans for withdrawal from Front Royal and the plans to destroy all bridges behind them. She realized that if she could get this information to General Jackson he could hasten his attack and save the bridges.

  On May 22, 1862, the day before the Battle of Front Royal, General Richard Stoddard Ewell, under command of General Thomas Jackson, stopped on a hill overlooking Front Royal in order to assess the troop strengths and position of the Union forces. He had no information and was unsure about an attack.

  While surveying the situation, the Confederate soldiers spotted a woman dressed in white leaving the town and heading toward their lines. The young woman was Belle Boyd. She had not bothered to take the time to saddle her horse for the journey, but raced on foot over the two-mile gap between the two armies. She delivered her message to General Jackson’s staff officer, Henry Kyd Douglas. The message advised General Jackson that the Yankee force was small with only one Maryland regiment, seven pieces of artillery, and several cavalry companies.