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The following is a Woman
of Courage profile written and produced by the St. Lawrence County,
NY Branch of the American Association of University Women. |
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Mary
Edwards Walker
Civil
War Doctor
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Mary
Edwards Walker, one of the nation's 1.8 million women veterans, was the
only one to earn the Congressional Medal of Honor, for her service during
the Civil War. She, along with thousands of other women, were honored in
the newly-dedicated Women
in Military Service for America Memorial in October 1997.
Controversy surrounded Mary Edwards Walker throughout her life. She
was born on November 26, 1832 in the Town of Oswego, New York, into an
abolitionist family. Her birthplace on the Bunker Hill Road is marked with
a historical marker. Her father, a country doctor, was a free thinking
participant in many of the reform movements that thrived in upstate New
York in the mid 1800s. He believed strongly in education and equality for
his five daughters Mary, Aurora, Luna, Vesta, and Cynthia (there was one
son, Alvah). He also believed they were hampered by the tight-fitting women's
clothing of the day.
His daughter, Mary, became an early enthusiast for Women's Rights,
and passionately espoused the issue of dress reform. The most famous proponent
of dress reform was Amelia Bloomer, a native of Homer, New York, whose
defended a colleague's right to wear "Turkish pantaloons" in her Ladies'
Temperance Newspaper, the Lily. "Bloomers," as they became known,
did achieve some popular acceptance towards the end of the 19th century
as women took up the new sport of bicycling. Mary Edwards Walker discarded
the unusual restrictive women's clothing of the day. Later in her life
she donned full men's evening dress to lecture on Women's Rights. |
In June 1855 Mary, the only woman in her class, joined the tiny
number of women doctors in the nation when she graduated from the eclectic
Syracuse Medical College, the nation's first medical school and one which
accepted women and men on an equal basis. She gratuated at age 21 after
three 13-week semesters of medical training which she paid $55 each for.
In 1856 she married another physician, Albert Miller, wearing trousers
and a man's coat and kept her own name. Together they set up a medical
practice in Rome, NY, but the public was not ready to accept a woman physician,
and their practice floundered. They were divorced 13 years later.
When war broke out, she came to Washington and tried to join the
Union Army. Denied a commission as a medical officer, she volunteered anyway,
serving as an acting assistant surgeon -- the first female surgeon in the
US Army. As an unpaid volunteer, she worked in the US Patent Office Hospital
in Washington. Later, she worked as a field surgeon near the Union front
lines for almost two years (including Fredericksburg and in Chattanooga
after the Battle of Chickamauga).
In September 1863, Walker was finally appointed assistant surgeon
in the Army of the Cumberland for which she made herself a slightly modified
officer's uniform to wear, in response to the demands of traveling with
the soldiers and working in field hospitals. She was then appointed assistant
surgeon of the 52nd Ohio Infantry. During this assignment it is generally
accepted that she also served as a spy. She continually crossed Confederate
lines to treat civilians. She was taken prisoner in 1864 by Confederate
troops and imprisoned in Richmond for four months until she was exchanged,
with two dozen other Union doctors, for 17 Confederate surgeons.
She was released back to the 52nd Ohio as a contract surgeon, but
spent the rest of the war practicing at a Louisville female prison and
an orphan's asylum in Tennessee. She was paid $766.16 for her wartime service.
Afterward, she got a monthly pension of $8.50, later raised to $20, but
still less than some widows' pensions.
On
November 11, 1865, President Johnson signed a bill to present Dr. Mary
Edwards Walker with the Congressional Medal of Honor for Meritorious Service,
in order to recognize her contributions to the war effort without awarding
her an army commission. She was the only woman ever to receive the Medal
of Honor, her country's highest military award.
In 1917 her Congressional Medal, along with the medals of 910 others
was taken away when Congress revised the Medal of Honor standards to include
only “actual combat with an enemy” She refused to give back her Medal of
Honor, wearing it every day until her death in 1919. A relative told the
New York Times: "Dr. Mary lost the medal simply because she was a hundred
years ahead of her time and no one could stomach it." An Army board reinstated
Walker's medal posthumously in 1977, citing her "distinguished gallantry,
self-sacrifice, patriotism, dedication and unflinching loyalty to her country,
despite the apparent discrimination because of her sex."
After the war, Mary Edwards Walker became a writer and lecturer,
touring here and abroad on women's rights, dress reform, health and temperance
issues. Tobacco, she said, resulted in paralysis and insanity. Women's
clothing, she said, was immodest and inconvenient. She was elected president
of the National Dress Reform Association in 1866. Walker prided herself
by being arrested numerous times for wearing full male dress, including
wing collar, bow tie, and top hat.
She was also something of an inventor, coming up with the idea of
using a return postcard for registered
mail. She wrote extensively, including a combination biography and commentary
called Hit and a second book, Unmasked, or the Science of Immortality.
She died in the Town of Oswego on February 21, 1919 and is buried
in the Rural Cemetery on the Cemetery Road.
A 20 cent stamp honoring Dr. Mary Walker was issued in Oswego, NY
on June 10, 1982. The stamp commemorates the first woman to have been awarded
the Congressional Medal of Honor and the second woman to graduate from
a medical school in the United States. |
The full text of her entry at the U.S. Army Center of Military History
of Medal of
Honor Citations follows:
WALKER, DR. MARY E.
Rank and organization: Contract Acting Assistant Surgeon (civilian),
U. S. Army.
Places and dates: Battle of Bull Run, July 21, 1861; Patent Office
Hospital, Washington, D.C., October 1861; Chattanooga, Tenn., following
Battle of Chickomauga, September 1863; Prisoner of War, April 10, 1864-August
12, 1864, Richmond, Va.; Battle of Atlanta, September 1864.
Entered service at: Louisville, Ky. Born: 26 November 1832, Oswego
County, N.Y.
Citation:
Whereas it appears from official reports that Dr. Mary E. Walker,
a graduate of medicine, "has rendered valuable service to the Government,
and her efforts have been earnest and untiring in a variety of ways," and
that she was assigned to duty and served as an assistant surgeon in charge
of female prisoners at Louisville, Ky., upon the recommendation of Major-Generals
Sherman and Thomas, and faithfully served as contract surgeon in the service
of the United States, and has devoted herself with much patriotic zeal
to the sick and wounded soliders, both in the field and hospitals, to the
detriment of her own health, and has also endured hardships as a prisoner
of war four months in a Southern prison while acting as contract surgeon;
and
Whereas by reason of her not being a commissioned officer in the
military service, a brevet or honorary rank cannot, under existing laws,
be conferred upon her;
and
Whereas in the opinion of the President an honorable recognition
of her services and sufferings should be made:
It is ordered, That a testimonial thereof shall be hereby made and
given to the said Dr. Mary E. Walker, and that the usual medal of honor
for meritorious services be given her.
Given under my hand in the city of Washington, D.C., this 11th day
of November, A.D. 1865.
Andrew Johnson,
President
(Medal rescinded 1917 along with 910 others, restored by President
Carter 10 June 1977.) |
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