| 11-11 TABLE of CONTENTS:
Dr. Mary Edwards Walker
Abigail Adams
DATES, ANNIVERSARIES, and
EVENTS
QUOTE by
Abigail Adams.
Event: 11-11-1865: legend or fact?
Did President Andrew Johnson
present Dr. Mary Edwards Walker
the U.S. Congressional Medal of Honor at the personal recommendation of
General Sherman for her heroism in treating wounded in hospitals and on
the battle fields.
What is known is that she did treat the wounded and
that she was taken prisoner for several months by the Confederates. However,
she had angered many officers because she insisted on wearing an Army uniform
even though she had been refused an Army commission, but was allowed to
served as a volunteer doctor along with commissioned officer men.
She had been married in trousers and refused to take
the vows of honor and obey or her husband's name. After the war she continued
her ways by wearing trousers and speaking out about suffrage and dress
reform and found it more and more difficult to make a living and she became
more and more eccentric.
She eventually became a sideshow attraction with her
Medal of Honor.
On June 3, 1917 an Army review board revoked the medal
saying she had not warranted it - records were missing or waylaid - and
the claims were that there was no existing proof that she actually was
awarded it and that the tales were just tales.
She refused to give it up.
She died several years later. (1917 was at the height
of agitation by women for the vote.)
On June 10, 1977, the medal was formally restored
by an act of the U.S. Congress. Because of the strong anti-woman feelings
regarding Dr. Walker, the truth may never been known although it is definite
that she did serve, served in trousers, and irked the male doctors and
officers.
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Remember this Lady
Born Nov. 11, 1744, Abigail
Smith Adams, wife of the second President of the U.S. and mother of the
sixth, won celebrity as a gifted letter-writer. She managed the farm and
business matters, while her husband spent much of his time away during
and after the Revolutionary War, and she made him a wealthy man. John often
extolled his wife's wisdom and claimed she would make an ideal politician.
The following well-known exchange of letters occurred while he was in Philadelphia
with the Continental Congress in 1776: Abigail wrote:
"By the way, in
the new code of laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make,
I desire you would remember the ladies and be more generous and favorable
to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power in the hands
of husbands. Remember all men would be tyrants if they could. If particular
care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined to foment
a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we
have no voice or representation."
John Adams, the future
President of the United States and signer of the Declaration of Independence
which declared all men are created equal, was not pleased by his wife's
letter. He answered:
"As to your extraordinary
code of laws, I cannot but laugh!
"We have been told that our struggle has loosened
the bonds of government everywhere - children and apprentices... schools
and colleges... Indians and Negroes grow insolent. But your letter was
the first intimation that another tribe more numerous and powerful than
all the rest, were grown discontented... Depend on it, we know better than
to repeal our masculine systems. Although they are in full force, you know
they are little more than theory. We are obliged to go fair and softly,
and you know in practice we are the subjects. We have only the name of
masters, and rather than give up this which would completely subject us
to the despotism of the petticoat, I hope General Washington and all our
brave heroes would fight!"
What has been pointed
out is that Abigail wrote with an inclusive "ladies" and "we"
which indicates that there was a definite, active feminist movement at
the time which has been overlooked by HIStorians... and some of the states
had accepted women voting without until AFTER the adoption of the U.S.
Constitution.
The study of HERSTORY puts a different light on our
foreFATHER's "justice for all" and the defects in HIStory coverage.
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11-11 DATES, ANNIVERSARIES, and
EVENTS
B. 11-11-1846, Ann Katharine Green, her
The Levenworth Case (1878) is considered the first detective story
written by a woman and is considered the developer of the scientific detective
novel. Her Ebenezer Gryce's scientific and deductive reasoning investigator
predates Sherlock Holmes. Although her writing was of the age, her plotting
and adherence to factual legal maneuvering is admirable today.
Event 11-11-1922: the Women's Overseas Service
League published the names of 162 women
known to have been killed in military service during World War I. [See
WiiN's Military Women]
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QUOTES DU JOUR
ADAMS, ABIGAIL:
"...we are determined to foment a rebellion..." [See
above]
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