Women’s War

Fighting and Surviving the American Civil War

By: Stephanie McCurry

Narrated by: Teri Schnaubelt

Length: 8 hrs and 1 min

Publisher's summary

In this groundbreaking reconsideration of the Civil War, the award-winning author of Confederate Reckoning invites us to see America's bloodiest conflict not just as pitting brother against brother but as a woman's war.

When the war broke out, Union soldiers assumed Confederate women would be innocent noncombatants. Experience soon challenged this simplistic belief. Stephanie McCurry reveals the vital and sometimes confounding roles women played on and off the battlefield. We meet Clara Judd, a Confederate spy whose imprisonment for treason sparked heated controversy, defying the principle of civilian immunity and leading to lasting changes in the laws of war. Hundreds of thousands of enslaved women escaped across Union lines, upending emancipation policies that extended only to enslaved men. The Union's response was to classify fugitive black women as "soldiers' wives," regardless of whether they were married - offering them some protection but placing new obstacles on their path to freedom.

In the war's aftermath, the Confederate grande dame Gertrude Thomas wrestled with her loss of status and of her former slaves. War, emancipation, and economic devastation affected her family intimately, and through her life McCurry helps us see how fundamental the changes of Reconstruction were.

©2019 Stephanie McCurry (P)2019 Tantor

Critic reviews

"[Stephen McCurry] demonstrates how women's participation changed not only their lives but the very understanding of war itself--its laws, its mechanisms of violence, its legacies and aftermath. In this brilliant exposition of the politics of the seemingly personal, McCurry illuminates previously unrecognized dimensions of the war's elemental impact." (Drew Gilpin Faust, author of This Republic of Suffering)

Informative, deceiving title

I learned a lot in this book about life, social structures and the local and federal governments’ intentions and missteps during Civil War and Reconstruction- specifically in regard to women. The title of book however led me to believe that I would be hearing of stories of how women fought-in and played instrumental roles in the Civil War - I do not feel this was the case of a majority of the book. The author had access to a diary of a former plantation owning women. This document gave great insight to everyday life and is worth hearing. I feel they relied heavily on that document as the main source of their story.
This is not “No man’s land: The Trailblazing Women Who Ran Britain’s Most Extraordinary Military Hospital During World War I” or “Code Name Veracity”. That said, it is an important look at this period of time focusing on the women’s position in society and how the nuclear families evolved in the south.

Good

Very good book if looking for a history of women in war. Black women too.

Pedantic

This well-narrated book is more like an academic treatise than an engaging listen for those interested in hearing a good story or stories.

A Gendered Exploration of the American Civil War

McCurry demonstrates the relevance of gendered power relations to the experience and changes of the Civil War.

Not exactly as advertised

Excellent narrator, though some pronunciations are off (Dubois is pronounced doo-bwah, not doo-boyss). I purchased this book because I am interested in both Women's history and US Civil War history, with a particular leaning towards the "average woman". I found the text to be pretty general, and very few bits of information not already covered in general Civil War history books. Anecdotes of women, but no particular focus on any in particular --- except at the end of the book discussing Reconstruction. It was as if instead of going to the next chapter, I went to a new book. Don't get me wrong, it is interesting, but it wasn't what I "came" for when purchasing and listening. It focuses exclusively on one woman, based off of her published journal, and both the family's financial struggles post-war and the woman's personal struggles with ex-slaves taking their place in society and "miscegination". While I would be interested in reading a book about this woman and her family, it just felt very specific and in depth compared to the rest.