“Women in the Revolution” 
by Mary Beth Norton

The American Revolution was more than a series of battles. It was a civil war, bringing profound consequences for all of society. The prolonged disruption of normal life patterns changed the role of women from being largely domestic into fields from which they had been previously excluded. 

Regional differences were evident. New England was the first to experience the war, but after the British evacuated Boston in 1776, the region was relatively free of conflict except for coastal areas that remained subject to attacks. The Middle states, especially around New York and Philadelphia, bore the consequences of continual British presence from 1777-1783. The South spared until after 1778, suffered continual British attack and guerilla conflicts, devastating the region both economically and socially. Regardless of the region, however, American women shared similar experiences: threat from enemy troops, disease, and decisions relating finance and political affairs of their husbands.

There are many historical records of panic and terror among families where British troops destroyed homes and possessions. Women, like those in Boston, had to choose between fleeing to protect themselves and their children or remaining to protect homes exposed to gunfire across enemy lines, with little access to food or firewood (stolen by the British for fuel) or that risked being burned or destroyed by British troops as they tried to destroy the economy and spirit of the Americans.

Even after the troops left, epidemics of disease like smallpox and dysentery remained. Women were faced with monumental decisions. Little could be done about dysentery, but smallpox had a new and risky defense: inoculation. Smallpox followed the army camps and the British employed a “hellish policy” of intentionally spreading the disease. Women had to make the decision of whether to place her family in “mortal danger” by risking introducing live portions of the disease into the body, in hope of preventing infection, or waiting and risking the deadly infection. Both choices tempted death.

Fear of attack and brutality are found in accounts of rape especially from the region around New York, New Jersey and Connecticut. Attacks by British soldiers upon young women were systematic and brutal with threat of death or disfigurement for resistance.

In southern regions around Virginia and the Carolinas conditions differed from the Northern experience in terms of length and intensity of the battles. The “Banditti” style of plundering and guerilla attack devastated the southern region with looting, plundering, destruction of crops and desertion of the Negro workforce. “Day[s] of terror” came with British troops accompanied by armed blacks robbing homes of clothing and jewelry and leaving the people constantly preparing to flee.

Whereas white women faced trouble and distress at the hands of the redcoats, black women had a decidedly different experience. The British offered slaves the opportunity to win liberty, without restriction to age or sex. The irony is that this British effort to undermine the southern workforce caused thousands of slave women, sometimes with their whole families, to seek refuge with the same armies that represented oppression and devastation to the white women. This irony became more intense during the process of the peace settlement. Former slaves were not always safe in British encampments occasionally being recaptured and returned into slavery; after treaty negotiations began, many slaves to be returned to their former masters. However records show that approximately 10,000 black slaves left on British ships out of Savannah and Charleston alone prior to the end of the war. Regardless of the final outcome, black women faced an intense quandary during the war. Running to the redcoats meant risking their lives and those of their children but gaining the possibility of freedom; staying meant remaining in bondage but with family intact. Both were wrenching decisions.

Women were profoundly affected by their husband’s politics. Patriot wives fared better than loyalist wives. Loyalist wives were frequently forced to seek refuge behind British lines. Once their husbands professed loyalty to the Crown, regardless of their own feelings, loyalist wives risked loss of homes and possessions, which they generally forced to abandon and flee to “alien” lands in England, Canada or the West Indies.

Women could accompany their soldier husbands as cooks, nurses, or laundresses, but generally only women who had no other means of support during their husband’s absence sought this option. In the camps women did most of the work but this was generally regarded as a hindrance. (One strike against camp conditions did improve some poor conditions for women.)

Women who had previously engaged in business adjusted best to the new circumstances of war. However, society still restricted women’s activities and without Power Attorney arranged by her husband a woman had no legal ability to conduct business. Not all women were deterred from successfully conducting the affairs of home and business during these times. Many women had to devise new means of supporting their families during their husband’s absence. When the men returned many women were quite reluctant to return to a position of subservience to their husbands.

The experiences and disruptions of the war affected all Americans. The cumulative result was a partial breakdown of gender roles. However, only minor changes resulted. Lines between masculine and feminine traits were less defined but they did not disappear. War did show there was no sharp line between men and women in responsibilities. Women did not gain substantially but respect grew for the role of women, and her obligation to create the backbone of the country — a supportive home in which to raise republican sons to love and serve their country -- was elevated. Prior to the revolution, domesticity seemed unimportant; post-revolution the social significance of the household and family was more recognized. American began to comprehend a woman’s importance beyond the private household and marital relationship. Roles of men and women were seen as complementary but not identical. In spite of brief experiments with woman’s suffrage, such in New Jersey, women still had political rights subjected to her husband. Within the legacy of the American Revolution can be seen the earliest seeds of the future woman’s revolution. Although Republican womanhood eventually became Victorian womanhood the earliest vocabulary of the woman’s rights movement had been born.

1.  Illustrate the similarities and differences in the experiences of women in the various regions of the colonies during the American revolution.

2.  Explain the challenges and opportunities for women during the war period including:

        A. health and disease

        B.  threats from soldiers (contrast white and black women’s vies of the Redcoats)

        C. financial roles

3.  How were women affected by their husbands’ political activism prior to and during the revolution?

4.  What impact did the war have on the role of women in society in both the short and long term?

economically

politically

socially

5.  To what extent was the American Revolution a Radical or a Conservative Movement?  Explain.