A woman's social status depended on the social status of her male relatives. Women of this time period held no status of their own and in most cases considered second class citizens. They had no voting rights and could not own land. The stereotypical role was of wife and mother but their actual chores and duties encompassed so much more. Even before the war, women worked for pittance in factories or alongside their husbands on the farms. During the Civil War, life would ask from them so much more. From the large plantations to the small farms dotting the countryside, the burden of the homefront fell upon all the shoulders of those left behind when the men marched off to war.
Women worked with organizations like the Sanitary Commission in the north and assorted Soldier's Aid Societies on both sides of the lines to bring relief to soldiers in the field and in hospitals. They raised their children, plowed fields, tended livestock, worked long hours in dangerous conditions in factories and protected their homes from renegade soldiers. A desperate need allowed them to become nurses caring for the wounded on and off the battlefield. A few followed their men into the ranks of the armies fighting alongside them until the end of the war unless they were discovered due to injury or giving birth. Many became refugees as their towns and homes were destroyed by the passing war. Some of these followed the armies becoming washerwomen, cooks, or providing other services such as mending to the soldiers. Others fled to the homes of family members. In some cases, they came searching for male relatives after the loss of their homes. Yes, there were also those who fell from grace to become "soiled doves", known today as ladies of the evening or prostitutes. During these tragic years, women were forced to do what was necessary to survive. Out of this would come the beginnings of women's suffrage and the fight for women's rights.
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