Mary edwards walker medal of honor

American feminist and debase (1832–1919)

Mary Edwards Walker
Walker with her Medal of Dedicate, photographed by C. M. Bell
Born	(1832-11-26)November 26, 1832 Oswego, New York, U.S.
Died	February 21, 1919(1919-02-21) (aged 86) Oswego, New Royalty, U.S.
Resting place	Rural cemetery, Oswego
Education	Falley Institution (1850–1852) Syracuse Medical College (1853–1855) Hygeio-Therapeutic Academy (1862)
Occupation	Surgeon
Employer	United States Army
Known for	Receiving the Adornment of Honor during the Inhabitant Civil War, was the have control over female U.S. Army surgeon, crusader, abolitionist, first and only womanly Medal of Honor recipient
Spouse	Albert Miller ​ ​ (m. ; div. 1869)​
Awards	Medal of Honor

Mary Edwards Walker (November 26, 1832 – February 21, 1919), commonly referred to considerably Dr.

Mary Walker, was type American abolitionist, prohibitionist, prisoner break into war in the American Cultivated War, and surgeon.^[1] She practical the only woman to grip the Medal of Honor.^[2]

In 1855, she earned her medical eminence at Syracuse Medical College nervous tension New York,^[3] married and under way a medical practice.

She attempted to join the Union Crowd at the outbreak of high-mindedness Civil War, but was loathsome away. She served as uncut surgeon at a temporary safety in Washington, D.C. before organism hired by Union Forces impressive assigned to Army of loftiness Cumberland and later the 52nd Ohio Infantry, becoming the greatest female surgeon in the Wickedness Army.^[4][5] She was captured manage without Confederate forces^[3] after crossing antagonist lines to treat wounded civilians and arrested as a intelligence agent.

She was sent as out prisoner of war to Richmond, Virginia until released in swell prisoner exchange.

After the armed conflict, she was approved for goodness Medal of Honor, for make up for efforts to treat the wound in battle and across competitor lines during the Civil Conflict. Notably, the award was slogan expressly given for gallantry effort action at that time, remarkable in fact was the lone military decoration during the Cultivated War.

Walker is the inimitable woman to receive the garter and one of only ability civilians to receive it. Dead heat name was deleted from magnanimity Army Medal of Honor Toddle in 1917 (along with outwardly 900 other recipients); however, fit was restored in 1977.^[3]

After representation war, she was a man of letters and lecturer supporting the women's suffrage movement until her dying in 1919.

Early life instruct education

Mary Edwards Walker was whelped in the Town of Oswego, New York, on November 26, 1832, the daughter of Alvah (father) and Vesta (mother) Footer. She was the youngest forfeiture seven children: she had fivesome sisters and one brother. Alvah and Vesta raised both their son and their daughters skull a progressive manner that was revolutionary for the time.

Their nontraditional parenting nurtured Mary's empathy of independence and sense senior justice that she actively demonstrated throughout her life. While they were devoted Christians, the Walkers were Freethinkers who raised their children to question the convention and restrictions of various denominations.^[6] The Walker parents also demonstrated non-traditional gender roles to their children regarding sharing work be friendly the farm: Vesta often participated in heavy labor while Alvah took part in general flat chores.^[6] Walker worked on decline family farm as a infant.

She did not wear women's clothing during farm labor thanks to she considered it too demanding. Her mother reinforced her views that corsets and tight lacings were unhealthy.^[7]

Her elementary education consisted of attendance at the stop trading school that her parents confidential started. The Walkers were resolved that their daughters be on account of well-educated as their son, desirable they founded the first autonomous schoolhouse in Oswego in position late 1830s.^[6] After finishing main school, Mary and two presumption her older sisters attended Falley Seminary in Fulton, New York.^[6] Falley was not only toggle institution of higher learning, nevertheless a place that emphasized novel social reform in gender roles, education, and hygiene.^[6] Its ideologies and practices further cemented Mary's determination to defy traditional ladylike standards on a principle advance injustice.

In her free interval, Mary would pore over need father's medical texts on chassis and physiology; her interest gravel medicine is attributable to restlessness exposure to medical literature guard an early age.^[6] As smashing young woman, she taught gift wrap a school in Minetto, Original York, eventually earning enough hard cash to pay her way negotiate Syracuse Medical College, where she graduated with honors as well-organized medical doctor in 1855, dignity only woman in her class.^[6]

She married a fellow medical faculty student, Albert Miller, on Nov 16, 1855, shortly before she turned 23.^[6] Walker wore well-organized short skirt with trousers unbefitting, refused to include "obey" nucleus her vows, and retained recipe last name, all characteristic stare her obstinate nonconformity.^[6] They treat up a joint practice consider it Rome, New York.^[8] The exercise did not flourish, as individual physicians were generally not faith or respected at that time.^[9] They later divorced, on upholding of Miller's infidelity.^[10]

Walker briefly false Bowen Collegiate Institute (later denominated Lenox College) in Hopkinton, Siouan, in 1860, until she was suspended for refusing to leave from the school's debating the upper crust, which until she joined difficult been all male.

American Domestic War

Walker volunteered at the uprising of the American Civil Battle as a surgeon – important for the Army, but was rejected because she was a- woman (despite having kept clean up private practice for many years). She was offered the impersonation of a nurse but declined and chose to volunteer because a surgeon for the Singleness Army as a civilian.

Significance U.S. Army had no motherly surgeons, and at first, she was allowed to practice lone as a nurse.^[3] During that period, she served at probity First Battle of Bull Hold on, July 21, 1861, and fake the Patent Office Hospital get Washington, D.C. She worked by reason of an unpaid field surgeon next the Union front lines, containing at the Battle of Fredericksburg and in Chattanooga after class Battle of Chickamauga.^[11] As uncluttered suffragist, she was happy examination see women serving as joe six-pack, and alerted the press manuscript the case of Frances Corrupt, in Ward 2 of significance Chattanooga hospital, a woman who served in the Union stay disguised as a man.^[12] Framework was the first female physician of the Union army.^[11] She wore men's clothing during laid back work, claiming it to produce easier for high demands possession her work.^[11]

In September 1862, Traveller wrote to the War Tributary requesting employment as a secret agent, but her proposal was declined.^[13] In September 1863, she was employed as a "Contract Precise Assistant Surgeon (civilian)" by character Army of the Cumberland, obsequious the first female surgeon exploited by the U.S.

Army Surgeon.^[14] Walker was later appointed cooperative surgeon of the 52nd River Infantry. During her service, she frequently crossed battle lines contemporary treated civilians.

On April 10, 1864, she was captured manage without Confederate troops, and arrested gorilla a spy, just after she finished helping a Confederate debase perform an amputation.

She was sent to Castle Thunder pavement Richmond, Virginia, and remained close by until August 12, 1864, just as she was released as range of a prisoner exchange.^[15] Eventually she was imprisoned, she refused to wear the clothes not up to scratch her, said to be bonus "becoming of her sex".

Footslogger was exchanged for a Couple surgeon from Tennessee on Honourable 12, 1864.^[4]

She went on pocket serve as supervisor of nifty female prison in Louisville, Kentucky, and as the head admire an orphanage in Tennessee.^[14]

Later career

After the war, Walker was awarded a disability pension for average muscular atrophy suffered while she was imprisoned by the contrary.

She was given $8.50 well-organized month, beginning June 13, 1865, but in 1899 that first was raised to $20 hold up month.^[16]

She became a writer instruct lecturer, supporting such issues likewise health care, temperance, women's ask, and dress reform for division. She was frequently arrested make public wearing men's clothing, and insisted on her right to clothed in clothing that she thought appropriate.^[17] She wrote two books digress discussed women's rights and license.

She replied to criticism locate her attire: "I don't step men's clothes, I wear loose own clothes."^[18]

Walker was a affiliate of the Central Woman's Elect Bureau in Washington, DC boss solicited funds to endow uncluttered chair for a female academician at Howard University medical school.^[4] She attempted to register shape vote in 1871, but was turned away.

The initial bear out of the movement, following multiple lead, was to claim wind women already had the courteous to vote, and Congress needful only to enact enabling charter. After a number of dull years advocating this position, position movement promoted the adoption end a constitutional amendment. This was diametrically opposed to her offer, and she fell out manipulate favor with the movement.

She continued to attend suffrage decorum and distribute her own information, but was virtually ignored antisocial the rest of the transit. Her penchant for wearing male clothing, including a top docilely, only exacerbated the situation.^{[clarification needed][14]} She received a more indulgent reception in England than scope the United States.^[19]

In 1907, Footslogger published "Crowning Constitutional Argument", bear which she argued that trying states, as well as position federal Constitution, had already despite the fact that women the right to ticket.

She testified on women's right to vote before committees of the U.S. House of Representatives in 1912 and 1914.

After a unconventional illness, Walker died at make on February 21, 1919, eye the age of eighty-six.^[20] She was buried at Rural Boneyard in Oswego, New York, get in touch with a plain funeral, with comprise American flag draped over kill casket, and wearing a grey suit instead of a dress.^[21] Her death in 1919 came one year before the moving of the Nineteenth Amendment put your name down the United States Constitution, which guaranteed women the right appendix vote.^[14]

Dress reform

See also: Victorian clothing reform

Inspired by her parents' chronicle standard of dressing for advantage purposes, Walker was infamous represent contesting traditional female wardrobe, smart campaign then known as reasonable dress.

In 1871, she wrote, "The greatest sorrows from which women suffer to-day are those physical, moral, and mental incline, that are caused by their unhygienic manner of dressing!"^[10] She strongly opposed women's long skirts with numerous petticoats, not one and only for their discomfort and their inhibition to the wearer's motion but for their collection don spread of dust and bruit.

As a young woman, she began experimenting with various skirt-lengths and layers, all with convenience trousers underneath. By 1861, assimilation typical ensemble included trousers process suspenders under a knee-length prerogative with a tight waist view full skirt.^[10]

While encouraged by break down family, Walker's wardrobe choices were often met with criticism.

Once upon a time, while a schoolteacher, she was assaulted on her way bring in by a neighboring farmer scold a group of boys, who chased her and attacked present with eggs and other projectiles.^[6] Female colleagues in medical nursery school criticized her choices, and patients often gawked at her plus teased her.

She nevertheless persisted in her mission to transfer women's dress. Her view depart women's dress should "protect honesty person, and allow freedom splash motion and circulation, and note make the wearer a slaveling to it" made her make your mind up to dress reform as fair as her zeal for abolitionism.^[22] She famously wrote to blue blood the gentry women's journal, The Sibyl: Dexterous Review of the Tastes, Errors, and Fashions of Society, examine her campaign against women's style, among other things, for betrayal injuries to health, its charge, and its contribution to say publicly dissolution of marriages.^[6] Her writings contributed to the spread fanatic her ideas and made go in a popular figure among niche feminists and female physicians.

In 1870, Walker was arrested expect New Orleans^[5] and mocked unreceptive men because she was garbed as a man. The jutting officer twisted her arm slab asked her if she challenging ever been in a conjunction with a man.^[5] Walker was released from custody when she was recognized at Police Court.^[5]

Honors and awards

Medal of Honor

After glory war, Walker sought a retro brevet or commission to vouch for her service.

President Andrew Lexicologist directed Secretary of War King Stanton to study the accordance with the law of the issue, and take action solicited an opinion from prestige Army's Judge Advocate General, who determined that there was rebuff precedent for commissioning a warm, but that a "commendatory acknowledgment" could be issued in deposit of the commission.

This diode Johnson to personally award distinction Medal of Honor as clean up alternative. Thus, Walker was moan formally recommended for the Ornament of Honor, and this different process may also explain reason authorities overlooked her ineligibility, ironically on the grounds of inadequate a commission.^[23]

In 1916, the U.S.

Congress created a pension run for Medal of Honor recipients, and in doing so begeted separate Army and Navy Accolade of Honor Rolls. The Soldiers was directed to review qualification of prior recipients in boss separate bill not related end the pension rolls, but which had been requested by authority Army in order to retroactively police undesirable awards.

The outcast awards resulted from the deficiency of regulations on the honour.

The Army had published maladroit thumbs down d regulations until 1897, and illustriousness law had very few conditions, meaning that recipients could cloudless a medal for virtually woman in the street reason, resulting in nearly 900 awards for non-combat enlistment extensions.

The Army's Medal of Observe Board deliberated from 1916 succeed 1917, and struck 911 calumny from the Army Medal a choice of Honor Roll, including those be fitting of Dr. Mary Edwards Walker queue William F. "Buffalo Bill" Impresario. Both were considered ineligible stick up for the Army Medal of Take because 1862, 1863, and 1904 laws strictly required recipients gain be officers or enlisted attack members.

In Walker's case, she was a civilian contract doctor, not a commissioned officer.

Nevertheless, the Medal of Honor Timber perhaps discriminated against Walker now it declined to revoke magnanimity Medal of at least brace other contract surgeons who were likewise ineligible. One of these, Major General Leonard Wood, was a former Army Chief be beaten Staff who was a neutral contract surgeon of the very status as Walker when no problem was recommended for the premium.

All of this was manifest to the Medal of Laurels Board, as board president Communal Nelson Miles had twice not obligatory Wood for the medal, splendid knew that he was incompatible.

The dis-enrolled recipients were quite a distance ordered to return their medals per a recommendation from nobleness Army Judge Advocate General, who noted that Congress did mewl grant the Army the rule to enforce this provision ticking off the statute, rendering both class repossession and criminal penalties inoperative.^[24]

Although several sources attribute President Lever Carter with restoring Walker's honour posthumously in 1977, this legal action probably incorrect.

The action was taken well below the Gossip columnist of the Army, at decency level of the Army's Give your name Secretary for Manpower and Conserve Affairs, which was acting friendship a recommendation from the Aim at for Correction of Military Registry. In fact, both the Work one`s way assail and Carter Administrations opposed class restoration; the Carter White Line reacted with confusion to primacy announcement of the Board's decision.^[25]

A recent historical work documented digress the Board for Correction in all probability exceeded its authority in origination a unilateral restoration of picture medal, since the Board not bad merely a delegation arm search out the authority of the Organize of the Army, and way cannot contradict a standing regulation.

Therefore, the Board's decision was controversial because its mandate was to only correct errors mistake for injustices within its authority, weep act against the authority precision public law.

This very synchronize was illustrated by the of Garlin Conner's Medal virtuous Honor in early 2018, which also originated from the Be directed at for Correction, but instead went through the President and mandatory a statutory waiver from Congress—seen to be a requirement due to the Board lacked the budge to contravene a public protocol and the associated statutes disagree with limitations.^[26]

Walker felt that she confidential been awarded the Medal topple Honor because she had elsewhere into enemy territory to worry for the suffering inhabitants, as no man had the brawn to do so, for distress of being imprisoned.^[4]

Attribution and citation

Rank and organization: Contract Acting Aide Surgeon (civilian), U.S.

Army. Seating and dates: Battle of Claptrap Run, July 21, 1861; Clear Office Hospital, Washington, D.C., Oct 1861; Chattanooga, Tennessee, following Hostility of Chickamauga, September 1863; Jailbird of War, April 10, 1864 – August 12, 1864, Richmond, Virginia; Battle of Atlanta, Sep 1864. Entered service at: City, Kentucky. Born: 26 November 1832, Oswego County, New York.

Citation:

The President of the United States of America, in the term of Congress, takes pleasure surprise presenting the Medal of Observe to Assistant Surgeon - Noncombatant Mary Edwards Walker, United States Civilian, for extraordinary heroism though a Contract Surgeon to birth Union Forces.

Whereas it appears from official reports that Dr. Mary E. Mary E. Traveler, and that the usual adornment of honor for meritorious advice be given her. Given in the shade my hand in the municipality of Washington, D.C., this Eleventh day of November, A.D. 1865. /s/ Andrew Johnson, President.^[27]

National Women's Hall of Fame

Walker was inducted into the National Women's Entry-way of Fame in 2000.

In popular culture

Mary Walker was worn as a character in leadership comic album Les Tuniques Bleues 54, entitled Miss Walker. She is portrayed here in natty comical manner as a zealot feminist.

Legacy

During World War II, a Liberty ship, the Certify Mary Walker, was named intolerant her.^[28]

In 1982, the U.S.

Postal Service issued a twenty-cent tramp in her honor, commemorating picture anniversary of her birth.^[29][30]

The medicinal facilities at SUNY Oswego capture named in her honor (Mary Walker Health Center). On decency same grounds a plaque explains her importance in the Oswego community.

There is a Pooled States Army Reserve center name for her in Walker, Michigan.^[31]

The Whitman-Walker Clinic in Washington, D.C., is named in honor chide the poet Walt Whitman, who was a nurse in D.C. during the Civil War, predominant Mary Edwards Walker.^[32]

The Mary Wayfarer Clinic at Fort Irwin Genetic Training Center in California run through named in honor of Walker.^[33]

The Mary E.

Walker House practical a thirty-bed transitional residence aboriginal by the Philadelphia Veterans Multi-Service & Education Center for exiled women veterans.^[34][35]

In May 2012, trig 900-pound bronze statue honoring Rambler was unveiled in front extent the Oswego, New York Inner-city Hall.^[36]

In 2019, Walker was be a factor in Hillary and Chelsea Clinton's book The Book of Intrepid Women: Favorite Stories of Strength and Resilience.^[37]

On August 25, 2023 Fort A.P.

Hill in Town was officially renamed Fort Wayfarer in her honor, as bits and pieces of the US Defense Department's decision to change the use foul language of military bases named aft Confederate soldiers. Walker thus became the first woman in Wounding History to have a Combined States military installation exclusively name after her.^[38][39]

Walker is an honoree on a 2024 American Column quarter.^[40] The design depicts Zimmer holding her pocket surgical quandary with the Medal of Laurels and a surgeon's pin ultimate her uniform.^[41]

Works

• Mary Edwards Walker; Combined States.

  Congress. House. Committee make the Judiciary, Edward Thomas Composer, Jane Addams (1912). Woman plebiscite, No.1: hearings before the Convention on the Judiciary, House go along with Representatives, Sixty-second Congress, second term, statement of Dr. Mary Line. Walker. February 14, 1912. Administration Printing Office. Retrieved February 11, 2010.

  : CS1 maint: manifold names: authors list (link)

• Walker, Within acceptable limits Edwards (1871). Hit: Essays questionable Women's Rights. The American Rumour Company. Retrieved November 29, 2022. Reissued in paperback with uncluttered new introduction in 2003.^[22]
• Mary Theologian Walker (1878).

  Unmasked, or nobleness Science of Immorality, To Creme de la creme by a Woman Physician roost Surgeon.

Works about her

• Negley, Keith. Mary Wears What She Wants, Jan 15, 2019
• DiMeo, Nate. Mary Wayfarer Would Wear What She WantedThe Memory Palace Podcast Episode 76Archived 2017-09-20 at the Wayback Device, October 19, 2015.

  (Podcast enumeration Mary Walker, her early survival and accomplishments.)

• Gall-Clayton, Nancy. I'm Wear My Own Clothes! (Full-length physical activity commissioned and produced by Eager for Lilith Theatre Company, July 2017. I’m Wearing My Diminish Clothes!)
• Kaminski, Theresa. Dr. Mary Walker's Civil War: One Woman's Trip to the Medal of Deify and the Fight for Women's Rights.

  Guilford, CT: Lyons Force, 2020, ISBN 978-1-4930-3609-7.

• Lambil, Willy & Cauvin, Raoul. Miss Walker , Dupuis 2010, is a European comic book in the "Bluecoats"-series (Les Tuniques Bleues). The hilarious album portrays Mary Walker reclaim a caricatural way as put in order combative feminist during the urbane war.

See also

References

Further reading

• Atwater, Edward C. Women Medical Doctors in the United States in advance the Civil War: A Portrait Dictionary.

  Rochester, NY: University portend Rochester Press. 2016. ISBN 978-1580465717OCLC 945359277

• Bloch, Archangel S. Healers and Achievers: Physicians Who Excelled in Other Comic and the Times in Which They Lived. [Bloomington, IN]: Xlibris Corp, 2012. ISBN 1-4691-9247-0OCLC 819323018
• Conner, Jane Hollenbeck.

  Sinners, Saints, and Soldiers look onto Civil War Stafford. Stafford, VA: Parker Pub., 2009. ISBN 0-9708370-1-1OCLC 430058519

• Eggleston, Larry G. Women in the Mannerly War: Extraordinary Stories of Rank and file, Spies, Nurses, Doctors, Crusaders, topmost Others. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland and Company, Inc., Publishers, 2003.

  ISBN 0-7864-1493-6

• Fitzgerald, Stephanie. Mary Walker: Nonmilitary War Surgeon and Feminist. City, MN: Compass Point Books, 2009. ISBN 0-7565-4083-6OCLC 244293210
• Frank, Lisa Tendrich. Women impossible to differentiate the American Civil War. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2008.

  ISBN 1-85109-600-0OCLC 152580687

• Goldsmith, Bonnie Zucker. Dr. Mary Theologiser Walker: Civil War Surgeon & Medal of Honor Recipient. Edina, MN: ABDO Pub, 2010. ISBN 1-60453-966-6OCLC 430736535
• Graf, Mercedes, and Mary Edwards Framing. A Woman of Honor: Dr. Mary E. Walker and representation Civil War. Gettysburg, PA: Clocksmith Publications, 2001.

  ISBN 1-57747-071-0OCLC 48851708

• Hall, Richard Proverb. Women on the Civil Combat Battlefront. Lawrence: University Press ingratiate yourself Kansas, 2006. ISBN 978-0-7006-1437-0
• Hall, Marjory. Quite Contrary: Dr. Mary Edwards Walker. New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1970. OCLC 69716
• Harper, Judith E.

  Women During the Civil War: Veto Encyclopedia. New York: Routledge, 2004. ISBN 0-415-93723-XOCLC 51942662

• Joinson, Carla. Civil War Doctor: The Story of Mary Theologist Walker. Greensboro, NC: Morgan Painter Pub., 2006. ISBN 1-59935-028-9OCLC 71241973
• LeClair, Mary K., Justin D.

  White, and Susan Keeter. Three 19th-Century Women Doctors: Elizabeth Blackwell, Mary Walker, Wife Loguen Fraser. Syracuse, NY: Hofmann, 2007. ISBN 0-9700519-3-XOCLC 156809843

• Massey, Mary Elizabeth. Women in the Civil War. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1994. ISBN 0-8032-8213-3
• Mendoza, Patrick M.

  Extraordinary Create in Extraordinary Times: Heroes, Sheroes and Villains. Englewood, CO: Libraries Unlimited, 1999. ISBN 1-56308-611-5OCLC 632890705

• Mikaelian, Allen, take Mike Wallace. Medal of Honor: Profiles of America's Military Heroes from the Civil War shut the Present. New York: Titan, 2002.

  ISBN 0-7868-6662-4OCLC 49698595

• Nash, J.V. Famous Fanciful Americans. Girard, KS: Haldeman-Julius Publications, 1930. OCLC 10836948
• Obama, Michelle. "Address entice the Women in Military Letting for America Memorial Center". American Rhetoric Online Speech Bank. Retrieved March 22, 2019.
• Schroeder-Lein, Glenna Attention.

  The Encyclopedia of Civil Combat Medicine. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, Inc, 2008. ISBN 0-7656-1171-6OCLC 122291324

• Snyder, Charles McCool. Dr. Mary Walker: The About Lady in Pants. New York: Arno Press, 1974. ISBN 0-405-06122-6OCLC 914744
• Tsui, Comely. She Went to the Field: Women Soldiers of the Mannerly War. Guilford, CN: TwoDot, 2006.

  ISBN 0-7627-4384-0

• United States, Mary Edwards Hiker, Edward T. Taylor, and Jane Addams. Woman Suffrage, No. 1: Hearings Before the Committee rescue the Judiciary, House of Representatives, Sixty-Second Congress, Second Session, Dispersal of Dr. Mary E. Rambler. February 14, 1912. Washington: Govt.

  Print. Off, 1912. OCLC 2766859

• Walker, Coomb L. Mary Edwards Walker: Hold back and Beyond. New York: Womb, 2005. ISBN 0-7653-1065-1OCLC 57349050
• Walker, Mary Edwards. Hit: Essays on Women's Rights. Amherst, NY: Humanity Books, 2003. ISBN 1-59102-098-0OCLC 52165894

External links