Examining the role of women in the Civil War

FALLS VILLAGE — The heroes of the Civil War were not found just on the battlefields, but on the home fronts as well. And many of those helping in the Union cause can be traced to the local area.

In his talk titled “All Honor to the Ladies: Litchfield County Women and the Civil War,” Peter Vermilyea described the role women played during that period.

“It’s a local story, but also a national story,” he told those gathered at the South Canaan Meetinghouse for the second installment of the “First Tuesdays at 7” series put on by the Falls Village-Canaan Historical Society.

Vermilyea is a familiar figure in the Northwest Corner, heading up the social studies department at Housatonic Valley Regional High School, as well as an author and speaker on local history.

Using three old newspapers as major sources, the Housatonic Republican, Litchfield Enquirer and Winsted Herald, he was able to glean a great deal of information on the topic. Since there was a long tradition of women in Litchfield County being activists back to the Revolutionary War, it followed that ladies aid societies would become popular. “They give us a glimpse of how they exercised agency and expressed their own beliefs,” he said.

In the 1830s, many traditional responsibilities were replaced by machinery, so women were looking for something else besides their “moral obligation” to raise children. The war provided a purpose for women to get together. The aid societies took root in Bridgeport, primarily filled with well-to-do women. But they grew to more than 20,000 chapters across the north and saw expanded memberships.

Vermilyea elicited laughter when he said at first, “The primary purpose for women was to ‘remain cheerful.’”

When it was discovered women were very capable in several areas, such as recruitment of soldiers, they were tapped to perform certain duties. But as Vermilyea emphasized throughout the talk, they were welcomed “as long as they remained in the women’s sphere and didn’t try to do the work of men or else they were pushed back.” Handling money was not something with which women were entrusted.

Hartford became the clearinghouse for the societies, from where information was disseminated about what the troops needed. For example, the women of Norfolk made flannel shirts for soldiers in Missouri. A large number of items were collected from Bethlehem, where a huge rally to protest the war was held and a slogan saying, “Let it no longer be said Bethlehem is a secession town,” was displayed. The women of Kent knitted socks designed with tiny images of Jefferson Davis with a noose around his neck.

Vermilyea spoke about calls going out across the nation for lint, but it couldn’t be that from cotton because the fabric contained acid. Only lint from linen was usable for making bandages. He shared the long list of items that the women gathered and sent to the troops.

The talents displayed by the ladies aid societies can be traced to the start of several women’s movements, such as suffrage and temperance, Vemilyea said.