Women in the Civil War

by Larry G. Eggleston

  Her acting ability made the assignment an exciting role, and she was so convincing that she even fooled Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton, who was considered a very suspicious man. In her disguise as a British subject, she was even invited to join President Lincoln’s party when they reviewed the Army of the Potomac at Fredricksburg. This invitation allowed her to secure a pass for Virginia.

  Lottie had delivered all the messages to the Confederate agents and had quietly ridden on to Virginia by the time Secretary Stanton became aware of the deception. She continued gathering information on the way home, and ran into no problems until she reached Winchester, Virginia, where she was stopped and questioned by Union General F. J. Milroy.

  General Milroy listened to her tale about being a British subject trying to recover her health. She told him she was confused and had gone to the wrong Hot Springs. She then begged him for a pass through the lines. He was a bit suspicious of Lottie and had her examined by his surgeon to verify her illness.

  On the way to the hospital for the examination, she claimed to have become so ill that she could not go into the hospital unassisted. Two Union soldiers carried her into the hospital in a straight-backed chair. During the examination, Lottie claimed that rheumatism had affected her heart and she cried when the doctor touched her. She moaned with false agony as she dislocated her jaw. The doctor was at a loss and stated that hers was a sad case. She was carried back to her carriage, given a pass, and was soon on her way again. Her acting ability had saved her once more.

  While Lottie was busy completing her mission to Washington, Ginnie was delivering messages to Nathan Bedford Forrest about the Union troop movements and strengths around the Memphis, Tennessee, area. She was often captured but arrested only once. Each time she was released as her acting ability, like Lottie’s, came to her rescue. The Memphis Commercial Appeal described Ginnie: “She needed no pass to get through the Union lines, her eyes and her way won her permission everywhere.”

  In February 1863, Confederate General Sterling Price had vital information, which needed to be delivered to Confederate agents in Western Ohio. Because Ginnie had relatives in Ohio, she volunteered for the assignment. Her reason for traveling would be to visit relatives. The trip began in an ambulance accompanied by eight Confederate soldiers. When they arrived in Memphis, Tennessee, Ginnie stopped and picked up her mother to further legitimize the purpose for the trip. They then proceeded slowly toward her brother-in-law’s home near Oxford, Ohio, 25 miles northeast of Cincinnati.

  The trip went as planned and Ginnie was successful in delivering all the messages. After a short visit with their relatives Ginnie and her mother made their way down to the Ohio River to Cincinnati where they had booked passage aboard the cargo ship Alice Dean. Ginnie was carrying a secret message for General Sterling Price in her bosom.

  Before the ship could set sail, Union officers entered their stateroom and arrested the two ladies for treasonous acts. The Commanding officer, Captain Harrison Rose, demanded that the ladies submit to a physical search. Ginnie was quite upset by such a demand. She reached into her pocket, pulled out a Colt revolver and threatened to kill any man who tried to search her. She then yelled verbal abuses at Captain Rose and told him to get out of their stateroom with the luggage, keys, and his life. As he retreated, Ginnie quickly locked the door, removed the message from her bosom, wetted it with water, and swallowed it.

  Soon Captain Rose returned with help and both ladies were escorted to army headquarters where their belongings were thoroughly searched. The search revealed quilted garments, which were filled with opium, a quantity of quinine and forty bottles of morphine, all of which were desperately needed by the Confederacy. Mrs. Moon quietly tried to explain that the drugs were for her sickly children at home. This excuse was not believed and all their traveling attire was confiscated. However, the resourceful Ginnie didn’t let that deter her resolve to complete her assignment. By the next morning she had secured and sewn into the hems of her skirt and petticoats a total of forty bottles of morphine, seven pounds of opium, and a small quantity of camphor.

  General Ambrose E. Burnside. Courtesy Library of Congress.

  The ladies were free to proceed home, but before passes could be issued they had to appear before General Ambrose Burnside, who severely chastised the ladies for their activities. Ginnie looked the General straight in the eyes and replied, “General, I have a little honor, I could not have let you know what I carried or what I did.” The general was sympathetic and decided to handle their case himself in lieu of having the customhouse officers decide their punishment. They were kept under house arrest in a Cincinnati hotel.

  While under house arrest a strange thing happened which complicated the situation further. It seems that a young British woman who was requesting a pass through the lines was brought before General Burnside. The general immediately recognized Lottie Moon, the young woman he had once courted and who had jilted him at the altar. She turned on the charm and tried every trick she knew but to no avail. She soon found herself under house arrest with her sister and mother.

  General Burnside kept the three ladies in suspense for some time and had rumors of trials and executions passed on to them almost daily—an attempt to scare them into discontinuing their espionage activities. The ladies were held under surveillance for several months even though the charges were never pressed. They were allowed to walk around the city but were always watched. The Moon sisters used this opportunity to collect marriage proposals from Yankee gentlemen as well as to gather valuable information, which they easily passed on to Confederate agents in the Cincinnati area.

  The three ladies were finally released and allowed to return home. Hoping to stop their Confederate operations, the Union officers in the area of their home required all three ladies to report at ten o’clock each morning to Union General Hurlbert. This order was short-lived because Lottie and Ginnie used it as an opportunity to gain Union information. After three months of such reporting, the frustrated general ordered the Moon family to leave and not come back.

  In late 1864 the sisters received a letter from their brother who was ill from wounds suffered in the war. He, his wife, and their two children had escaped to southern France and invited Ginnie and Lottie to come and live with him. The two sisters and their mother obtained passes and proceeded to Newport, Virginia, where they planned to book passage to France. Union General Benjamin Butler stopped these plans by ordering the three ladies to take an oath of loyalty to the Union if they wanted to continue their trip to France. All three ladies indignantly refused and were kept in custody for several months. Every day of their captivity they were reminded that if they took the oath they could proceed on their way to France. When told that they might as well abandon their Confederate convictions and take the oath because they would be forced to when Butler reached Richmond anyway, Ginnie quickly replied, “If Butler’s in Richmond, he’ll be nailed to a tree.” That was all it took for the Union general to realize they would never take the oath. He then had them escorted back to Confederate territory and they were not allowed to continue on to France.

  Even after the war had ended the Moon sisters never accepted defeat. Ginnie ran a male boarding house and was a heroine during the yellow fever epidemic during the 1870s. By the time she was 75 years old she decided to become an actress again but this time she wanted to do so in Hollywood. She contacted producer Jesse Lasky about a job. Mr. Lasky asked her what made her think she could act. Ginnie stamped her foot, folded her arms and firmly replied, “I’m 75 years old and I’ve acted all of them.” Mr. Lasky nodded and said, “You’ll do.”

  Ginnie appeared in many early films with such famous people as Pola Negri, Douglas Fairbanks, and Mary Miles Minter. In September 1926, at the age of 81, she was found dead, stretched out on the floor with her pet cat.

  Prior to the end of the war Lottie married Judge Clark who was active in the Copperhead movement in Tennessee. After the war, Lottie and her husband moved to Ne
w York where she became a writer and pioneer newspaper correspondent. She covered the European capitals during the Franco-Prussian War. No further records can be found for her remaining years.

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  Olivia Floyd: Confederate Spy

  She was credited with saving the lives of 14 Confederate officers who were being tried for war crimes by the Union. Her name was Miss Olivia Floyd and she was a Confederate spy and smuggler.

  Olivia Floyd was born in 1824 in Port Tobacco, Virginia. The Floyd family was living on Rose Hill Estate in Charles County, Maryland, in 1861 when the Civil War began. Olivia was the daughter of David and Sarah Semmes Floyd. The Floyd family considered themselves Southerners and was sympathetic to the Confederate cause. Soon after the war began, Olivia’s younger brother Bob went south and joined the Confederate army. Olivia and her mother remained at their home on the Federal side of the Potomac River.

  Their large, two-story brick home soon became a popular gathering place for Federal soldiers. As their home became more popular, Olivia had the opportunity to gather important military information which she then could pass on to her Confederate contacts. Olivia became very resourceful at gathering information. She used the hollow brass balls at the top of the fireplace andirons to hide the messages that she prepared for the Confederacy. She also smuggled clothing, money, letters, and other information frequently through the Union lines to the Confederate troops.

  Her main contact in the North was a Union officer who was stationed in Alexandria, Virginia. He was a Confederate agent who helped in the escape of many Southern sympathizers to Richmond. His messages were always signed with a “J” to help keep his identity a secret.

  As Olivia intensified her methods of gathering and transmitting information, she began to arouse some suspicion. On November 10, 1862, Judge Advocate General L.C. Turner sent a message to Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton. In it, he indicated that Olivia Floyd was known to be “engaged in all sorts of disloyal practices and is in frequent and intimate communication with an officer in our army who signs himself ‘J’.” Her name was revealed in a correspondence that the government intercepted, which indicated that one of their Federal officers was a Confederate spy. His code name was “J” and all of his correspondence was signed “J.” Judge advocate Turner issued an order that Olivia be arrested and transported to Old Capitol Prison in Washington, D.C., in the hope that she would reveal the identity of the Union officer “J.” For some reason Olivia avoided arrest and the order was not carried out. Perhaps Federal authorities discovered the identity of the officer by other means and Olivia no longer seemed to be much of a threat. Whatever the reason, it allowed Olivia to continue her espionage activities until the end of the war.

  By the time the war came to a close Olivia had become a vital link in the chain of spies and messengers that operated along the great spy route which ran between Richmond, Virginia, and the Confederate agents in Canada. In early 1865, this ring of agents, working through Olivia, was successful in obtaining the release of 14 Confederate officers who had been arrested on criminal charges and were waiting to be tried.

  To save them from being tried and possibly executed, messages and papers needed to exonerate the officers were forwarded to Olivia and were quickly hidden in the andirons. When Union authorities came to search her home, as they often did, she simply invited them in and let them search until they were satisfied. The searchers never found any evidence that Olivia was a spy. She would then boldly invite them to sit by the fire and warm their feet upon the very andirons that contained the hidden messages. As additional messages arrived they were added to the andirons. On February 15, 1865, all of the needed documents were gathered at Olivia’s home. The information was then forwarded to the courthouse by special courier. These messages and documents saved the Confederate officers from possible execution.

  Near the end of the war Olivia was given $80,000 in bank notes by one of her Confederate contacts. She was to hold the money for him while he was in hiding. She hid the money in the sofa near the fireplace. When she invited the Union officers to sit and warm their feet, they never realized that they were sitting on a fortune. The money was returned to its rightful owner after the war.

  Olivia was said to have psychic powers and she was interested in the occult. She also believed in ghosts and spirits, and a huge ghost dog was reported to have guarded her home (supposedly seen by many people). This rumor kept many superstitious Confederates as well as Yankees from crossing her doorstep after dark.

  After the war, one of the Confederate officers, Colonel Bennett Young, learned about Olivia’s role in his release and the release of the other 13 Confederates and invited her to be his guest at a reunion of Confederate Veterans. She was completely surprised when she turned out to be the guest of honor. The reunion was held in Louisville, Kentucky, and was the highlight of Olivia’s declining years. She spent the remainder of her life at Rose Hill and often talked of this great honor.

  She died December 10, 1905, at the age of 81, and was buried in the parish cemetery beside her brother Bob. It is reported that all of Charles County mourned her death because there would never be another person like Miss Olivia of Rose Hill.

  The New York Times published the news of her death on December 12, 1905, and in the article called her a “famous woman blockade runner of the Confederacy.”

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  Mrs. E. H. Baker: Union Spy

  Although she is credited with only one major mission as a spy, it was of vital importance. She gathered information for the Union about the Confederate secret underwater boat and the building of the ironclad ship C.S.S. Virginia (Merrimac). Her name was Mrs. E. H. Baker.

  Mrs. Baker lived in Richmond, Virginia, prior to the Civil War. Because of her strong loyalty to the Union and the impending possibility of war, she left Richmond and moved to Chicago, Illinois. When the war began in 1861, she was already working as a Pinkerton agent. In early 1862, Pinkerton sent her south on her first major mission. She was an ideal choice for the mission because of the friends and contacts she already had in the Richmond area. Her assigned area was between Richmond and Washington. She was assigned to gather information on the new undersea boats which the Confederates were rumored to be making.

  Mrs. Baker accepted the offer and proceeded to Washington where she was trained and briefed on her first assignment. This first assignment began in December 1862, when she was asked to gain the confidence of her old friends, the Atwaters, who lived in Richmond and had a son who was a Confederate captain.

  Once she gained the Atwaters’ confidence, she was to gain entrance into the Tredegar Iron Works. The security at the Tredegar Iron Works was very tight because this facility was where the Confederacy’s underwater boat and ironclads were being built.

  Mrs. Baker returned to Richmond and re-acquainted herself with all her old friends, especially the Atwater family. She soon became good friends with Captain

  Atwater and his wife, and was warmly welcomed into their home. Captain Atwater and his wife introduced Mrs. Baker into the Richmond social circles where she quickly made many new friends. Her social calendar became so full that it kept her moving all around the Richmond area.

  She was always careful not to talk about the war. She accepted invitations from the Richmond society families, went to their parties, attended receptions and went along on many sightseeing trips. These sightseeing trips included viewing the Richmond earthworks and fortifications. She also attended many army drills and demonstrations. This social activity gave her the opportunity to memorize and document the city defenses, troop placements, and strengths.

  Finally, in a quiet seductive manner, she mentioned to Captain Atwater that she would like to tour the Tredegar Iron Works. Her manner evidently boosted his ego a bit because he agreed to get her a pass and also to act as her personal tour guide.

  However, when the time came, Captain Atwater informed Mrs. Baker that he was required to attend a demonstration and she would have to wai
t until the next day to visit the Tredegar Iron Works. He then invited her to accompany him and his wife to the demonstration. The demonstration was to test the prototype of the new underwater boat by sinking a ship in the river. Mrs. Baker witnessed this very successful test, after which Captain Atwater informed her that they were building a much larger underwater boat.

  The next day Mrs. Baker accompanied Captain Atwater to the iron works. While on this informative guided tour, she noticed many experimental weapons, such as the new submarine battery (commonly called a water mine) and a submarine ram (a rod on the bow of a ship which carried a mine used to ram an enemy vessel). She also saw the construction of the secret underwater boat and the prototype of the Confederate ironclad C.S.S. Virginia.

  Upon returning to her home, Mrs. Baker drew sketches of all that she had seen and sewed them into the lining of her bonnet.

  Several days later she told Captain Atwater that the war had made her so upset that she was afraid to stay in one place too long and she wished to return to her home in Chicago, if he would secure a pass for her. Captain Atwater and his wife both sympathized with her and she was given the pass.

  Mrs. Baker left Richmond the next day and met Mr. Pinkerton in Fredericksburg, Virginia. Mr. Pinkerton forwarded the drawings and information that he received from Mrs. Baker to the Navy. Within 24 hours after she left Richmond, the weapon sketches were in the hands of the Union authorities.

  Around the time that Captain Atwater had stated to Mrs. Baker that the underwater boats would be in operation, the U.S. Navy began dragging the entrance to the river each night after dark as a precaution. One of the boats caught and pulled up the air hoses from the new Confederate underwater boat as it was preparing to sink a Union warship. The Confederate crew was trapped inside and all drowned. The dragging of the channel entrance by the Union army made the Confederates realize that their element of surprise had failed.