Women's Role In The Revolutionary War

Carol Berkin’s book, Revolutionary Mothers: Women in the Struggle for American Independence, asserts that the Revolutionary War was not a romantic time period in our nation’s history. It was one of upheaval, tremendous discord and violence. The Revolutionary War was not one fought on distant shores, but one of blurring the lines between the battlefield and the home front. The war touched all classes of people from those of the new American nobility down to Blacks and First Nation. It provides us in a series of what I call vignettes or snapshots of the war and its effects. We are provided on how these differences between all the differing groups impacted the daily lives of women.

“Revolutionary Mothers” is a book written by Carol Berkin in 2005. The book mainly focuses women roles throughout the American Upheaval period. The purpose of writing this book was to help the reader to not only understand these roles but also apprehend the social/cultural norms throughout the struggle of America’s Independence period (Berkin 11). Berkin begins with a brief analysis of the cultural and social norms of women during the American Revolution era. Berkin then examines the way this era helped to change many of those cultural and social norms. She focuses on the way women engaged in diverse activities, which helped the war effort. She mentions a few of contributions that women made towards the American Revolution war. The author

During the pre-revolutionary America, women were not seen as part of formal and political decision making, they were not required to have more than basic education, and usually depended on men economically. Their role was to take care of children, perform household duties based on their husbands, social economic standing, and were only seen as thee males’ helpmates. Saying ‘No’ to a situation was the first American women’s political act(Berkin, 2005). It was because of women refusal to purchase shipped goods made from Britain that led to repealing of the act of 1765 which was passed in England.

Document A, shows a woman holding a musket and powder horn wearing a tricorn hat. This document bolsters that women’s roles were expanded during the American Revolution since they participated in the American Revolution and hints at the potential for revolutionary change in women’s roles. The Daughters of Liberty proved that they could do anything a man could do. When their husbands, brothers, and or sons went to fight in the war women had to continue making a living at home by assuming the tasks that the males had. The Daughters of Liberty were working relentlessly to prove their commitment to “the cause of liberty and industry.” Home manufacturing originated from when women made clothing for the people of their respective towns to boycott the British and when they had to produce products such as artillery as well as clothing for the American forces to utilize. Document J, a valedictory address by Molly Wallace from the Young Ladies’ Academy of Pennsylvania notifies us that friendly encouragement allowed herself to overcome apprehension due to sex, youth, and inexperience which will be an example that women can do anything they set their mind to and that if women are not denied the right to read, moreover they should not be denied the right to speak. Her speech increased discussion of educational opportunities for women and the Revolution had not yet greatly altered society’s perception of the role of women.

Another, more direct, example of women’s political influence emerged nearing the later years of the revolution. As the conflict dragged on, and resources became scarce for the Patriot soldiers,

The American Revolutionary War affected many American lives, including Mary Silliman’s. During this period, women did not have much voice outside of their household. Even though not in the revolutionary army, Mary Silliman fought a war where she endured hatred, sufferings, and moral temptations.

The role of women played in any given war is quite often severely underestimated. This sentiment especially goes for the American Revolutionary War, where women actually played an absolutely essential role in our victory against the British. Not only where there different types of women who had helped, but there were many different ways each of them helped--particularly as nurses to help save lives and tend to injured soldiers. Without women helping in the war, we would have most certainly lost (National History Education Clearinghouse).

As we study the Revolutionary War we tend to think of the men that revolted, fought, and petitioned, but have we ever thought about what the women did during the war? In Revolutionary Mothers: Women in the Struggle for America’s Independence, we get a chance to see the women’s side of the war and what they did during this troubling time. Carol Berkin shows us what each race and class of women went through and their contributions during the war with well researched information and her own techniques.

The part of the Revolution with which everyone is familiar was the struggle for independence. Less familiar was the struggle within America to redefine social roles and the nature and structure of society. The ethnically diverse, heterogeneous, patriotic population of the Revolutionary period was unified only in its determination to beat the British Wealthier, better established Americans often fought for conservative reasons. They wanted to preserve their traditional rights as Englishman, which they believed were being subverted by a corrupt British empire The poorer folk joined the Revolution in the hope of improving their station. Many of the regulars in Washington’s army had joined for cash bounties and the promise of land. Other poor people saw the war as an opportunity to realign social arrangements, forever casting off habits of deference, which had been conspicuous aspects of hierarchical pre-Revolutionary America. Women joined the struggle for similarly diverse reasons. As traditional helpmates to their well-heeled husbands, some wanted to provide support and preserve the status quo being threatened by imperial England. Others sought to make their society freer, more open and fluid, thereby improving the diversity of options available to women. Still others may simply have seized the opportunity to take more public, active and

During the American Revolution women had many roles. Some women would stay home with their children and take care of the house. Others would help in the war with different tasked. All of the jobs varied form easy to very difficult. Some jobs were even dangerous.

Despite all this, the growth of industry caused increased dependence on women, eventually leading to the creation of feminism. By following women’s role in society from the creation of the colonies, Zinn analyzes patterns of continuity and change over time in the development of feminism. The first women came to colonial America as a shipment of female servants: meant to bear children and act as domestic slaves. As servants, women faced abuse including whipping and molestation, their low position preventing them from protesting against their masters. Female slaves faced even harsher treatment due to their double oppression of slave and gender, often giving “birth to children in the scalding perspiration from the human cargo,” and even while “chained to corpses” (Zinn 96). Even freed women suffered from the English prejudices regarding women. According to English laws at the time, wedlock made a women’s “new self [her husband]… her superior; her companion, her master” (Zinn 97). Society assumed women “wanteth [sic] our [male] Reason for your Conduct, and our Strength for your Protection,” implying the inferiority and ineptitude of the female sex (Zinn 98). The role of women as servants in colonial America supported the general prejudices of the time and made it easier to disregard the female sex entirely. The arrival of the Revolutionary War helped some women defy gender roles by actively participating in the war efforts. The contributions that many women made remain ignored due to the inconsistency with the stereotypical qualities exemplified by the refined wives of Revolutionary leaders. Jefferson’s view that women ought not “to wrinkle their foreheads with politics” reflects the sexist ideas carried throughout the Revolution (Zinn 100). Industrialization between the

Women were considered frail, unintelligent, and unable to make decisions in eighteen-hundredths America. It was traditional wisdom that a woman’s place was in the home. The Civil War marked a turning point for women and their role in society. Through my research consisting of books, letters, speeches, and articles, I will tell the story of a time in America when women rose to satisfy the needs of the country when most men were away fighting the war. This essay will analyze the roles of women in eighteen-hundredths America, by evaluating how women’s roles had changed; they now were nurses, soldiers/spies, and public workers/activists.

Women were making themselves heard on the topic of emancipation and freedom, which is why upon meeting Harriet Beecher Stowe, Lincoln commented-“So, you’re the little woman who wrote the book that made this Great War.” The author, in this essay notes four developments that assess the impact women had upon the war. First, civil society emerged in the North. People began to read more, attend lectures on numerous subjects, they held civic parades and rituals, poured over political novels, and listened to stump oratories. Next, women were participating in this civil society. Women were starting to make their voices heard largely in part due to the investment in the education of girls, which provided a large literate audience. Then, there was a “social respect” developing for home and motherhood. Focusing on the Christian home provided the basis for reform with all society. Here, the woman of the house becomes the moral compass. So, slavery hit at the

The American Revolution began in 1775 as a war between the thirteen colonies in Great Britain and North America. There was a series of events that caused The American Revolution. This Revolution showed roles of woman at the time.When the war ended,and the colonies won their independence.Once the colonies won they all combined together to make the United States of America.

Women, regardless of the opposition, were determined to support their armies and their beliefs even on the battlefield. The North and South armies of the country were fighting without proper organization from their respective governments, leading women to volunteer to help their men in whatever manner they could. Contributing to the war effort, women were “responsible for much of the clothing, feeding, and nursing of the soldiers.”18 Women would cook and do the laundry for the soldiers, working in camps away from the battlefield. Other women would provide comfort for the dying soldiers, nurturing the wounded and staying with the men who were dying until their last moments. Their efforts were to offset the fact that the wounded men were separated from their loved ones and “represented domestic tranquility in the midst of armed conflict.”19 Women were not prohibited from nursing injured soldiers because it was “not yet a profession requiring special training…care of the sick and injured was traditionally a female skill”20. Nursing was not the only important contribution that women provided during the war. They also worked within their communities to make up for the men who had left to fight in the war, managing homes and plantations,