Posts by Pamela
Confederate Nurses, Pt 1
Both the television show Mercy Street, and Heroines of Mercy Street* look at Civil War nurses through the lens of a single Union hospital, Mansion House Hospital in the occupied city of Alexandria, Virginia. I use the “memoirs” of two women who nursed there, Mary Phinney von Olnhausen and Anne Reading,** as a framework for…
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Liar, Temptress, Soldier, Spy
Nursing wasn’t the only role that women played in the American Civil War. Women on both sides of the conflict organized soldier’s aid societies, effectively transforming homes, schools and churches into small-scale factories and shipping warehouses in which they made and collected food, clothing and medical supplies. Eighty years before Rosie the Riveter, they worked…
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My Book Is Out! (And I’m Giving Away Copies)
Today is the official publication date for Heroines of Mercy Street. If you pre-ordered the book, you should receive it shortly. If you’ve been waiting for it to appear on the shelves of your local library or independent bookstore, it could be there.* (If it’s not, you can ask them to order it for you.…
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