Answering+the+Call

Answering the Call: Black Nurses in the

Civil War

• 1861: no formally trained nurses• 10% of workers; 6% of nurses•Why did black women volunteer?• 2 reasons• 1862: Charlotte Forten• Jan. 1864: U.S. War Department

order• $10/month; 1 ration• Informal nursing• Visions of hospitals and those

who work within them

• Black women as natural resource• Regimental women vs. nurses• Sister Lydia Penny• Rhetoric of wifely duty• Susie King Taylor- Ft. Pulaski, GA• Runaway slave• Literate• Self-titled nurse• Tasks of nurses• Feelings of the sick/injured• Reminiscences of My Life in Camp

(1902)