A Soldier's Secret

by Marissa Moss

  “We did it!” I call, waving the telegram as I run into the store. “I’m official now!”

  “Congratulations!” Damon cheers. “That means you can come to the reunion next month.”

  “What reunion?” I ask.

  “A reunion for our old regiment. Here, in Flint. You need to be a member of the G.A.R., the Grand Army of the Republic, but now that you have an honorable discharge, all you have to do is apply and they’ll let you in.”

  “Are you sure? Maybe they won’t want me because I’m a woman.” I’ve put so much time and effort—two years of steady work tracking down comrades and sending materials to Congress—that I’m not ready to face another bureaucratic ordeal.

  “Let me take care of it,” Damon insists. “You’ll be at that reunion.”

  Many women veterans have applied to the G.A.R., but none have been admitted until my case reaches their office. The piles of papers testifying to my service along with my honorable discharge push them to give me a quick answer—yes, they would be proud to muster me into their association.

  That July I walk into the reunion, Damon at my side. The talk in the hall all swirls around the name Frank Thompson. “He’s here!” “He’s really a she!” “She’s here!”

  Richard Halsted, a private from our regiment, comes up to me first, then General Poe, then Dr. Bonine. My old friends crowd around, all eager to share some memory of how I helped them, how grateful they are to me.

  “You were the best orderly I had,” General Poe says, his voice thick with emotion. “I had no idea you were a woman, Frank, none at all.”

  I grin. It’s good to be called Frank again, and Poe isn’t the only one to lapse into using my old name. I don’t correct them. In some ways, I’ll always be Frank.

  The crowd quiets down for the keynote speech by Colonel Handy. His remarks are the traditional sort of thing said at these reunions until he comes to the end of his talk. “I know you’ve all heard the story of the remarkable Frank Thompson,” the colonel says. “He was a brave soldier who distinguished himself with uncommon daring as a postmaster, nurse, orderly, and even, I’m told, a member of the secret service. We all know now that ‘he’ was really a she. I’m proud and honored to introduce to you Sarah Emma Edmonds Seelye, alias Frank Thompson, your old friend and mine!”

  Applause thunders through the hall. I’m swept up by my old comrades’ support, buoyed by their affection. I stride to the dais, wearing men’s boots as usual. I wave and wait for the roar to hush.

  “My dear comrades,” I begin, my voice breaking. I take a deep breath and start again. “I am proud and honored to be part of your company, this brave brotherhood. I’ve never met better men than those of the Second Michigan. You taught me what it means to be loyal, courageous, and compassionate. Without you, I never would have become the person I am today. Strange to say, but living among you, surrounded by men, I learned to become a strong, independent, proud woman.”

  “Frank! Frank! Frank!” The crowd chants and claps. I wave again, then turn and shake hands with Colonel Handy. I step down into the crowd surging around me. Men thrust out hands to shake or simply smile and nod. It feels like I’ve truly come home. I’m back with the family that has always mattered most to me.

  Out of the mass of people, a tall, dark-haired man approaches me. My stomach drops. I know without a doubt.

  “Jerome,” I say.

  “Sarah.” He smiles.

  “I didn’t know you’d be here. Damon said the veterans had lost track of you. And I never heard from you.” I don’t know what to say, where to begin. I run my eyes over his familiar face. He’s older, yes—his dark hair is streaked with gray and the years have carved wrinkles on his face—but he’s as handsome as ever. It’s been two decades since I felt that familiar throb in my throat, that tingling warmth that being near Jerome has always sparked. So many years and the feeling is as strong as ever.

  “It’s good to see you, Sarah. I wanted to write to you when I saw your story in the newspaper, but I have to admit I was jealous like you thought. I was too hurt and angry to say anything for years.” Jerome pauses, lowering his eyes. “I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry for what? I didn’t write to you either. I was afraid you’d get in trouble if you knew where I’d gone when I left camp. I thought it was better to leave you out of it, but maybe I was wrong.” I take Jerome’s hand and press it warmly. “I’ve missed you all these years.”

  Jerome raises his eyes and pulls back his hand. “You don’t understand. I’m sorry for the rumors. I’m the one who started them. When you left so soon after James Reid, I … I mean, I thought … Well, I knew you were a woman sharing his tent, so I assumed that you were lovers. I’m so sorry—I’m the one who told people you were a woman and had left to follow your lover. It was me.”

  “You!” I gape. And then from deep in my chest, laughter rumbles. I throw back my head and roar. Jerome watches, perplexed.

  “I’m sorry,” I gasp. “It’s just so funny! You kept my secret for so long, and when you finally told people, you got it all wrong. Jerome, there was only one man I fell in love with in the army.”

  Jerome takes back my hand. “I know. I think I always knew.” He stares at the floor, avoiding my eyes. “And I read your book, I saw what you said about me.”

  “You were a good nurse, a true friend, so that’s what I wrote.” But my head is buzzing. I hadn’t imagined Jerome would read my words, that he would see me in all my faults, from the time I shot the Southern woman’s hand to the time I fell off the mule. All the many mistakes I made. And all the things I did right. Getting food for the men at Malvern Hill. Helping the wounded off the troop train that had been ambushed. And of course all my spy missions.

  I’m proud of who I was, who I am. I look Jerome in the eye. “How have you been?” I ask. “How is Anna? Any children?” My hand is warm in my old friend’s.

  “Anna died, years ago, in childbirth. It was our first child, and the baby died, too.”

  “I’m so sorry.” I read the lines of grief etched on Jerome’s face. They mirror my own. “I lost three children myself. I guess I wasn’t meant to have a family.”

  “Don’t say that,” Jerome says, raising my hand to his lips and kissing it, like I’m a real lady to him. Finally.

  I smile slowly. I’ve waited so long for this moment and I want to savor it. All the fragments are coming together; the parts of myself I’ve closed off or shoved down are free now. It’s taken many years, but I can be both Sarah Emma Edmonds and Frank Thompson. No more disguises for me. And no more secrets. Ever.

  Sarah Edmonds, with her hair cut short, dressed as Frank Thompson. She is wearing a man’s suit and a bow tie.

  Sarah dressed as a woman, wearing a dress, with her long hair swept back in a bun. (Dates of photographs unknown.)

  ARAH EMMA EDMONDS really existed, and the bones of the story told here are all true, from disguising herself as a man to flee an arranged marriage to serving with distinction in the Army of the Potomac. All the names used here, from Damon Stewart to Jerome Robbins to James Reid, belonged to actual soldiers who served with Sarah, and the lines of their stories are all based in fact. I’ve used Jerome’s diary as a source, along with letters and journals of other soldiers who served with Frank Thompson. The quotes from Frank’s diary and about her service and the congressional acts are real. Some of the events, places, names, and statistics that Sarah presents in her own writing have since been proved to be inaccurate (granted, she couldn’t be everywhere at once, and she was in the middle of a war!), so I have taken the liberty to stick to Sarah’s version. However, the timeline that follows is accurate.

  Although more than four hundred women are known to have dressed as men to fight in the Civil War, most of them were joining husbands, brothers, fathers, or fiancés. They had someone to help with their disguise and share the burden of their secret. Sarah Emma Edmonds was the only one known to have lived as a man before enlisting. Jennie Hodgers (or Hodgens
), who also fought with the Union, lived her entire life as a man, which is a different kind of story. Sarah was the only woman to be recognized by acts of Congress as an honorably discharged soldier, with rights to back pay and a pension, and the only woman allowed to join the Grand Army of the Republic, the association for Civil War veterans.

  In her memoir, she summed up what sustained her during the difficult battles and spy missions in the army:

  I am naturally fond of adventure, a little ambitious and a good deal romantic, and this together with my devotion to the Federal cause and determination to assist to the utmost of my ability in crushing the rebellion, made me forget the unpleasant items and not only endure, but really enjoy, the privations connected with my perilous positions. Perhaps a spirit of adventure was important—but patriotism was the grand secret of my success.

  Among the letters written to Congress urging that she be given an honorable discharge, one, written by Major Byron Cutcheon of the 20th Michigan, described Sarah’s bravery during the harrowing Battle of Fredericksburg, saying that she “rode with a fearlessness that attracted the attention and secured the commendation of field and general officers.”

  After leaving the army, Sarah married Linus Seelye. Although her children died as told in this book, her husband outlived her, as did two adopted sons. During their years together, she was said to wear the pants in the family, both literally and figuratively. Together they built the home for Civil War veterans that Sarah had dreamed of.

  Sarah really went to the reunion for the Second Michigan and received a moving tribute, but there is no record of Jerome Robbins being there to hear it. She was mustered into the Grand Army of the Republic, the organization for Civil War veterans, after the second act of Congress and went to that reunion as well. I’ve conflated the two reunions here for dramatic purposes. The only part I’ve taken the liberty to invent completely is the final meeting between Jerome and Sarah. It seemed like something that should have happened, and the advantage of fiction is that you can choose the shape of the story.

  The malaria that plagued Sarah ever since the Virginia Peninsula campaign caused her death in 1898 at the age of fifty-six. She was the only woman of her era granted a military funeral and is buried in a cemetery for Civil War veterans in Houston. Her headstone simply describes her as NURSE, the role she was proudest of.

  UNION ARMY OFFICER BIOGRAPHIES

  GENERAL AMBROSE E. BURNSIDE

  career military officer, Burnside took part in the Mexican-American War, although he arrived in Mexico after hostilities had ceased. He resigned his commission in 1853, turning his attention instead to manufacturing rifles, the Burnside carbine. He was named a brigadier general in the Rhode Island Militia at the outbreak of the Civil War. Because of his experience, he led a brigade in the Department of Northern Virginia, in the first Battle of Bull Run. After his initial ninety-day term of enlistment ran out, he was named brigadier general of volunteers and assigned to training the Army of the Potomac. He commanded the Coast Division in the early years of the war and did so well in his coastal campaign that he was promoted to major general. His forces were then moved to Virginia and became the IX Corps of the Army of the Potomac. When McClellan was removed from command of the Army of the Potomac, Burnside took over from him. Ordered by President Lincoln to take aggressive action after all of McClellan’s wavering, Burnside led the Army of the Potomac at the catastrophic Battle of Fredericksburg. When he failed again with his “Mud March,” the president replaced him with General Joseph Hooker, sending Burnside back to command the Department of the Ohio and his old troops in the IX Corps. Toward the end of the war, Burnside was blamed for the Confederate massacre of Union troops at the Battle of the Crater, near Petersburg, Virginia. Relieved of command, Burnside subsequently resigned his commission in 1865. He was later elected governor of Rhode Island, then U.S. senator. Besides giving the name “sideburns” to our lexicon in honor of his signature facial hair, Burnside served as the first president of the National Rifle Association.

  GENERAL DARIUS COUCH

  graduate of West Point, Couch fought in the Mexican-American War and the Seminole Wars. He was appointed to garrison command after the wars and subsequently took a short leave to do scientific research in Mexico. When the Civil War broke out, he was named commander of the Seventh Massachusetts Infantry, first as a colonel, then a few months later as a brigadier general. He commanded a brigade in the Army of the Potomac, then was given divisional command in the VI Corps, working and training around the capital. He led his troops in the Peninsula Campaign and the Maryland Campaign, and was then put in charge of the II Corps for the Battle of Fredericksburg. His men supported the engineers who built the pontoon bridges across the Rappahannock River. Once over the river, his troops incurred very heavy casualties attacking the fortified Confederate positions on Marye’s Heights and were forced to withdraw. After General Burnside was replaced by General Hooker, Couch continued to lead the II Corps in the Chancellorsville Campaign in Virginia. Unhappy with Hooker’s failures in that battle, Couch requested reassignment and was moved to command of the Department of the Susquehanna. He then fought in the Western Theater as commander of a division in the XXIII Corps of the Army of the Ohio for the rest of the war.

  MAJOR GENERAL WILLIAM B. FRANKLIN

  graduate of the United States Military Academy, Franklin served under General Philip Kearny in the Mexican-American War. Before the Civil War he worked as the engineer in charge of building the United States Capitol dome. With the declaration of war, he was named colonel of the 12th U.S. Infantry. Only a few days later he was promoted to brigadier general of volunteers. He subsequently became a corps commander in the Army of the Potomac, leading troops in the Peninsula Campaign, the Battle of Antietam (Maryland), and the Battle of Fredericksburg. General Burnside blamed Franklin personally for the disastrous defeat at Fredericksburg and suspected the major general of working to dismiss him from command. In retaliation, he had Franklin removed from field duty for months until he was reassigned to corps command in the Department of the Gulf. There Franklin led his men in the unsuccessful Red River Campaign and was wounded in the Battle of Mansfield, both in Louisiana. Put on a troop train with other injured soldiers, he was captured by Confederate partisans in a train ambush but managed to escape the next day, though his injury prevented him from returning to active duty.

  GENERAL ULYSSES S. GRANT

  West Point graduate who fought in the Mexican-American War, Grant quickly earned a reputation as an effective commander, gaining control of most of Kentucky and Tennessee and commanding the Union forces at the pivotal Battle of Shiloh. While Generals McClellan, Pope, Burnside, and Hooker were largely meeting with failure in the east, Grant defeated five Confederate armies and led his troops to an impressive victory at Vicksburg, Mississippi. After his success in the Battle of Chattanooga, Tennessee, President Lincoln promoted him to lieutenant general, in charge of all the Union armies. In that position Grant fought the Confederate general, Robert E. Lee, in the spring of 1864 for control of Virginia in a series of bloody battles leading up to the long siege of Petersburg, Virginia. Finally, in April 1865, Grant broke the siege, capturing Petersburg and Richmond, Virginia, and running the remnants of Lee’s army to ground at Appomattox Court House, effectively ending the Civil War after four bloody years. Grant was elected president in 1868 and served two terms.

  GENERAL SAMUEL HEINTZELMAN

  t the start of the war, Heintzelman enlisted in the 17th Pennsylvania Infantry and quickly became a division commander in the Army of Northeastern Virginia. Wounded in the first Battle of Bull Run, Heintzelman recovered and subsequently had command of units that included the Second Michigan Infantry. He went on to command the III Corps of the Army of the Potomac during the Peninsula Campaign and the second Battle of Bull Run. Afterward, he commanded the XXII Corps, which had partial responsibility for the defense of Washington, D.C.

  GENERAL JOSEPH HOOKER

  career military o
fficer, Hooker fought in the Seminole Wars and the Mexican-American War. After resigning from the regular army, he served as a colonel in the California militia. He had to borrow money to head east at the start of the Civil War; once there he requested a commission and was appointed brigadier general of volunteers. He commanded a brigade and then a division in Washington, D.C., under General McClellan, as the Army of the Potomac was being trained for battle. Hooker led the Second Division of the III Corps in the Peninsula Campaign, earning a reputation as a solid combat commander. When McClellan retreated at the end of the campaign, Hooker was transferred to Major General John Pope’s Army of Virginia, where he led a division in the III Corps under Major General Heintzelman. Hooker took over command of the III Corps of the Army of Virginia after the Northern Virginia Campaign and the second Battle of Bull Run. His troops were renamed the I Corps and transferred back to the Army of the Potomac to face the Confederate troops in Maryland. Hooker pushed hard at Antietam, and his troops continued the assault even after he left the field, wounded in the foot. Once he had recovered, he was named commander of the V Corps for a short time, then promoted to lead both the III and the V Corps. Despite his protests at Burnside’s suicidal decisions, he lost many men at the Battle of Fredericksburg. When Burnside was removed after the debacle, Hooker replaced him. He worked hard to restore the morale that had plummeted under Burnside’s disastrous command but suffered a major defeat in the Battle of Chancellorsville, routed by the smaller Rebel army. Having lost confidence in the general’s abilities, Lincoln replaced him with General Meade a few days before the Battle of Gettysburg in Pennsylvania. Hooker kept on fighting as a corps commander in the battles of Chattanooga and in the Atlanta Campaign. After Atlanta, Hooker spent the remainder of the war in command of the Northern Department, headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio. Because of the ribald atmosphere of his headquarters, rumors spread that his name had become a slang term for a prostitute.