Revolutionary Women

Because Independence Day is just around the corner, I'm dedicating the next few blog posts to our Founding Fathers and Mothers. I'll also spend some time with the "bad guys," you know, the ones who were not traitors to their home country.


Tonight, the ladies who did their fair share of butt kicking. 

• Catherine Moore Barry was a South Carolina native, and in 1781 the Patriots were about to get crushed at the Battle of Cowpens. Fortunately, however, they had Catherine. She knew the land and all the shortcuts, so she gathered some troops and led them to Patriots' aid. Together, they set a trap for Cornwallis and force the British to retreat to a place called Yorktown. If you slept through every history class of your life, Yorktown is where the British surrendered.
• Margaret Corbin followed her husband to war and helped the soldiers with laundry and cooking. But during the Battle of Fort Washington, the guy whose job it was to load the cannon was killed. So Margaret took over his job. Later in the battle, her husband was killed too, but she kept fighting. Then she was hit and wounded so badly she was left for dead. Just by the merest chance, a passing doctor found her. She lived, but she lost the use of one of her arms. For her bravery, she was given half of a soldier's pension, forty dollars a year and a clothing allowance. Later she petitioned Congress for, and won, the other half of the pension- a yearly allowance of rum or whiskey. She was the first woman buried at Arlington National Cemetery, and the only veteran of the Revolutionary War to be buried there.
• Nancy Hart lived in Georgia and was a big supporter of the Patriot cause. When a few British soldiers forced her to cook for them, she did, then killed them with their own guns. As if that weren't cool enough, when the Americans needed British battle plans, Nancy disguised herself as a schizophrenic man and wandered through the the Redcoat camp.
• Molly McCauley also followed her husband to war. In battle she served as watergirl for the Americans. When on the battlefield, she ran back and forth to the frontlines delivering water to the thirsty soldiers. This is how she got her famous nickname, "Molly Pitcher." During the battle of Monmouth, her husband was shot in the arm, so she took his place firing the cannon. The commander was so impressed by her bravery he promoted her on the battlefield to Sargent Molly Pitcher.
• Nancy Ward was a Cherokee woman who had lost her husband in a battle against the Creek Indians, so she retaliated by leading her husband's comrades into battle again and winning. She was made a member of the Council of Chiefs and was already a war hero when the Revolution began. The Cherokee were technically sided with the British, but not Nancy. In fact, she served as a double agent for the Americans.
• In 1776, the Founding Fathers were on the verge of not founding anything at all. They were having a meeting to discuss signing a proclamation of loyalty to Britain in return for Britain laying off a little bit. To Hannah Arnett, that was unacceptable. She crashed the meeting and literally chewed the Founding Fathers out. Some of the Patriot bigwigs were staying in her house and she overheard their talk of surrender. She called them cowards and traitors and told her husband Isaac (who was one of the important Patriots), that she would divorce him immediately if he became a Loyalist. He knew she was not kidding, thus the American Revolution happened.