By Ruth A. Ringelstetter
How did a young woman born in Virginia become a Confederate spy in the Civil War at the tender age of 17? And how did she end up buried in a cemetery in Wisconsin? After visiting her grave in October 2014, we knew we had to find out.
Maria Isabella "Belle" Boyd was born on May 9, 1844 in Martinsburg, Virginia (now West Virginia) in the Shenandoah Valley. She was a tomboy in her early years, climbing trees, running through the woods, and riding her horse. She was the oldest child and dominated her younger siblings. At age 12 she was sent to Baltimore’s Mount Washington Female College. She graduated at age 16 and returned to Martinsburg.
At the start of the Civil War, many residents of Martinsburg supported the Union, but Belle’s father was sympathetic to the Confederates. Belle was just 17 at the start of the war, but she decided to do anything she could to assist the Confederate cause.
Belle started out as an informal spy. She flirted with Union officers, garnering information and writing it in letters which she delivered to the Confederate side with the help of her slave or a young neighbor. When one of her deliveries was intercepted, she got off with a warning because she was so young.
After this, she decided to make her work more official and became a courier, delivering information and medical supplies. By the time she was 18, she was somewhat of a celebrity and was known by several names including “Cleopatra of the Secession,” “La Belle Rebelle," the “Siren of the Shenandoah" and the “Rebel Joan of Arc." This celebrity soon led to her first arrest. She was only held for a week, and immediately upon her release she returned to her work.
On one occasion while she and her mother were staying at a hotel in Virginia, she eavesdropped (through a keyhole or knothole) on Union soldiers in the room next door and delivered the information to Confederate officers. She is said to have received a personal note from Stonewall Jackson thanking her for her immense service.
During the war, she was arrested six times, imprisoned three times, and exiled twice. In 1862, a warrant was issued for her arrest. She was captured and taken to Old Capitol Prison. While there, she continued her exploits. She waved Confederate flags from her window, sang Rebel songs, and sewed messages with information she gleaned from the guards into rubber balls which she tossed out the window.
Belle lived for a time in England where she wrote her life story in a book she titled “Belle Boyd in Camp and Prison.” She was married three times, two of those to ex-Union officers. In late 1866, she returned to the United States after President Andrew Johnson’s amnesty proclamation.
Needing to support her family, Belle took to the stage, giving lectures and performing her own story. On June 11, 1900, she was on tour in Kilbourn, Wisconsin (now Wisconsin Dells), when she had a massive heart attack and died. She was 56.
She was buried in Spring Grove Cemetery and, for a time, her grave had just a simple marker until an anonymous southern man donated a gravestone which reads “BELLE BOYD, CONFEDERATE SPY, BORN IN VIRGINIA, DIED IN WISCONSIN, ERECTED BY A COMRADE.”
Apparently, at one point, some Virginians decided it would be a good idea to remove her remains from Wisconsin and move them to Virginia. To prevent that, a concrete cap was placed over the grave. Stones from every state of the old Confederacy were embedded in the cap. Before the cap was placed, soil from Virginia was sprinkled over the grave by the Daughters of the Confederacy.
I must admit, every source I consulted in my research gave mostly the same story, but small details were different in each. I also had many questions for which I found no answers. For instance, I couldn’t find out what happened to her third husband or her children. And, for whatever reason, she was buried in Wisconsin where she died. Visit her grave if you have the chance. It’s an interesting piece of history!
Happy Shunpiking!
Ruth
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Showing posts with label Civil War. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Civil War. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 13, 2019
Monday, November 9, 2015
Honoring America’s Civil War Veterans
By Joann M. Ringelstetter
This year marked the 150th anniversary of the end of the Civil War, which began on April 12, 1861 when Confederate troops opened fire on Union-held Fort Sumter in South Carolina and officially ended on April 9, 1865 when Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Courthouse in Virginia. However, it took weeks before word of this surrender was received across the country, so the last battle took place on May 13, 1865 at Palmito Ranch in Texas.
There are many causes for the Civil War. While the Northern regions became more and more industrialized, the Southern regions remained primarily agricultural. This caused different political beliefs and social cultures to develop, leading to disagreements about taxes, tariffs, and states’ rights.
The most divisive issue, however, appears to have been the dispute over whether the national government had the power to prohibit slavery in territories that were not yet states. When Abraham Lincoln pledged to prevent slavery from being established in the territories, seven deep South states seceded, forming a new nation called the Confederate States of America.
When the war started, the combined population of the Northern states was about 22 million, while the combined population of the Southern states was about 9 million. Thus, there were roughly twice as many Union soldiers as Confederate soldiers. The average age of the Union soldiers was about 25 and the average age of the Confederate soldiers is unknown, but towards the end of the war, young boys and old men were being pressed into service.
As battles were waged across the nation, families found themselves in the middle of battlefields, often seeking safety in their cellars when the fighting closed in on their homes.
In Arkansas, during the Battle of Prairie Grove in December, 1862, the conflict developed so quickly that families living near the battlefield had no time to flee. So they took shelter in cellars like this one, which has been preserved at Prairie Grove Battlefield State Park. Although this battle ended in one day, there were about 2,700 total Union and Confederate casualties.
Other families were forced to give up their homes to serve as field hospitals or battle headquarters. During the spring of 1865, in the final days of the Civil War, the North Carolina farmhouse of the John and Amy Harper family was taken over by Union soldiers on the first day of the Battle of Bentonville.
The downstairs rooms were converted into a field hospital and the Harpers were told they could either stay upstairs or leave their home altogether. At first, they chose to stay upstairs, but later they helped nurse wounded soldiers from both sides of the war.
Prior to their home being taken over by the Union Army, the war had already touched the Harper family. In September of 1862, their 16-year-old son Martin, who had joined the Confederate Army, was wounded in Maryland.
The Battle of Bentonville involved roughly 80,000 men (60,000 Union troops and 20,000 Confederate troops). When the intense three-day battle was over, more than 1,500 Union soldiers and 2,600 Confederate soldiers were dead, wounded, or missing. The makeshift hospital at the Harper House treated over 500 wounded soldiers, including 45 Confederates.
It is estimated that during the four years’ duration of the Civil War, there were 1.5 million Union soldiers and 1.2 million Confederate soldiers. And records reveal that at least 600,000 were killed in action or died of disease. The field of medicine was not very advanced at this time and modern antiseptics, which could have reduced disease and the spread of bacteria, did not exist. This resulted in more soldiers dying of disease than being killed in action.
Very often, after battles ended, soldiers were buried on the battlefield where they fought and died. If they died in field hospitals, such as the Harper House, they were buried near the hospital. At the Bentonville Civil War Battlefield in North Carolina, close to the Harper House, there is a Confederate Monument marking the mass grave of approximately 360 Confederates who died in the Battle of Bentonville.
Sometimes, the bodies of soldiers were later exhumed and moved to National or Confederate cemeteries. However, due to the sheer number of dead soldiers and the effort involved in moving their remains, undoubtedly thousands of Civil War soldiers are still buried in unknown battlefield graves.
A year after the Civil War ended, a medical doctor from Springfield, Illinois, and a small group of friends formed a plan for a fraternal organization of Union veterans for the benefit of its members and for their widows and orphans. On April 6, 1866, the first post of the Grand Army of the Republic was established in Decatur, Illinois. This organization played a major part in the establishment of the Memorial Day holiday. More importantly, they lobbied to secure pensions for Union veterans.
In the South, there were many local veterans associations, which became a part of the United Confederate Veterans association formed in New Orleans, Louisiana on June 10, 1889.
There are those who feel strongly that Confederate flags should not be flown and that monuments dedicated to Confederate soldiers should be destroyed. Others feel that all soldiers serve out of a great sense of duty to their country and they should be honored.
The inscription on the Confederate monument below sums this up beautifully: “Here, off duty till the last reveille, rest the Southern soldiers, few in number, who were slain in this and in the adjoining counties, during the war of secession. They fell among strangers, unknown, unfriended, yet not unhonored; for strangers hands have gathered their ashes here and placed this shaft above them, that constancy, valor, sacrifice of self, though displayed in fruitless enterprise, may not be unremembered.”
Wednesday, November 11, is Veterans Day. Please take a moment to honor all the veterans who have served our country, especially those who bravely fought and died.
Happy Shunpiking!
Joann
This year marked the 150th anniversary of the end of the Civil War, which began on April 12, 1861 when Confederate troops opened fire on Union-held Fort Sumter in South Carolina and officially ended on April 9, 1865 when Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Courthouse in Virginia. However, it took weeks before word of this surrender was received across the country, so the last battle took place on May 13, 1865 at Palmito Ranch in Texas.
There are many causes for the Civil War. While the Northern regions became more and more industrialized, the Southern regions remained primarily agricultural. This caused different political beliefs and social cultures to develop, leading to disagreements about taxes, tariffs, and states’ rights.
The most divisive issue, however, appears to have been the dispute over whether the national government had the power to prohibit slavery in territories that were not yet states. When Abraham Lincoln pledged to prevent slavery from being established in the territories, seven deep South states seceded, forming a new nation called the Confederate States of America.
When the war started, the combined population of the Northern states was about 22 million, while the combined population of the Southern states was about 9 million. Thus, there were roughly twice as many Union soldiers as Confederate soldiers. The average age of the Union soldiers was about 25 and the average age of the Confederate soldiers is unknown, but towards the end of the war, young boys and old men were being pressed into service.
As battles were waged across the nation, families found themselves in the middle of battlefields, often seeking safety in their cellars when the fighting closed in on their homes.
In Arkansas, during the Battle of Prairie Grove in December, 1862, the conflict developed so quickly that families living near the battlefield had no time to flee. So they took shelter in cellars like this one, which has been preserved at Prairie Grove Battlefield State Park. Although this battle ended in one day, there were about 2,700 total Union and Confederate casualties.
Other families were forced to give up their homes to serve as field hospitals or battle headquarters. During the spring of 1865, in the final days of the Civil War, the North Carolina farmhouse of the John and Amy Harper family was taken over by Union soldiers on the first day of the Battle of Bentonville.
The downstairs rooms were converted into a field hospital and the Harpers were told they could either stay upstairs or leave their home altogether. At first, they chose to stay upstairs, but later they helped nurse wounded soldiers from both sides of the war.
Prior to their home being taken over by the Union Army, the war had already touched the Harper family. In September of 1862, their 16-year-old son Martin, who had joined the Confederate Army, was wounded in Maryland.
The Battle of Bentonville involved roughly 80,000 men (60,000 Union troops and 20,000 Confederate troops). When the intense three-day battle was over, more than 1,500 Union soldiers and 2,600 Confederate soldiers were dead, wounded, or missing. The makeshift hospital at the Harper House treated over 500 wounded soldiers, including 45 Confederates.
It is estimated that during the four years’ duration of the Civil War, there were 1.5 million Union soldiers and 1.2 million Confederate soldiers. And records reveal that at least 600,000 were killed in action or died of disease. The field of medicine was not very advanced at this time and modern antiseptics, which could have reduced disease and the spread of bacteria, did not exist. This resulted in more soldiers dying of disease than being killed in action.
Very often, after battles ended, soldiers were buried on the battlefield where they fought and died. If they died in field hospitals, such as the Harper House, they were buried near the hospital. At the Bentonville Civil War Battlefield in North Carolina, close to the Harper House, there is a Confederate Monument marking the mass grave of approximately 360 Confederates who died in the Battle of Bentonville.
Sometimes, the bodies of soldiers were later exhumed and moved to National or Confederate cemeteries. However, due to the sheer number of dead soldiers and the effort involved in moving their remains, undoubtedly thousands of Civil War soldiers are still buried in unknown battlefield graves.
A year after the Civil War ended, a medical doctor from Springfield, Illinois, and a small group of friends formed a plan for a fraternal organization of Union veterans for the benefit of its members and for their widows and orphans. On April 6, 1866, the first post of the Grand Army of the Republic was established in Decatur, Illinois. This organization played a major part in the establishment of the Memorial Day holiday. More importantly, they lobbied to secure pensions for Union veterans.
In the South, there were many local veterans associations, which became a part of the United Confederate Veterans association formed in New Orleans, Louisiana on June 10, 1889.
There are those who feel strongly that Confederate flags should not be flown and that monuments dedicated to Confederate soldiers should be destroyed. Others feel that all soldiers serve out of a great sense of duty to their country and they should be honored.
The inscription on the Confederate monument below sums this up beautifully: “Here, off duty till the last reveille, rest the Southern soldiers, few in number, who were slain in this and in the adjoining counties, during the war of secession. They fell among strangers, unknown, unfriended, yet not unhonored; for strangers hands have gathered their ashes here and placed this shaft above them, that constancy, valor, sacrifice of self, though displayed in fruitless enterprise, may not be unremembered.”
Wednesday, November 11, is Veterans Day. Please take a moment to honor all the veterans who have served our country, especially those who bravely fought and died.
Happy Shunpiking!
Joann
Wednesday, April 8, 2015
Bells Across the Land: A Nation Remembers Appomattox
By Joann M. Ringelstetter
For the past four years, organizations across the United States have been holding events to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the American Civil War, which began on April 12, 1861 and ended roughly four years later.
On April 9, 1865, at Appomattox Court House in Virginia, Confederate General Robert E. Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia surrendered to Lt. General Ulysses S. Grant and the United States Army. Although the final battle took place on May 13, 1865 at Palmito Ranch, Texas, the surrender at Appomattox Court House is considered the symbolic end of the Civil War.
To commemorate this historic event, the bells of Appomattox Court House will ring at 3:00 p.m. on Thursday, April 9 to coincide with the moment the historic meeting between Grant and Lee ended. The National Park Service and its partners invite churches, schools, public buildings, historic sites, and others to ring their bells at 3:15 p.m. (Eastern Time) for four minutes (symbolic of the four years of the Civil War).
I will be sharing more information about the Civil War in upcoming blogs. Until then….
Happy Shunpiking!
Joann
For the past four years, organizations across the United States have been holding events to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the American Civil War, which began on April 12, 1861 and ended roughly four years later.
On April 9, 1865, at Appomattox Court House in Virginia, Confederate General Robert E. Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia surrendered to Lt. General Ulysses S. Grant and the United States Army. Although the final battle took place on May 13, 1865 at Palmito Ranch, Texas, the surrender at Appomattox Court House is considered the symbolic end of the Civil War.
To commemorate this historic event, the bells of Appomattox Court House will ring at 3:00 p.m. on Thursday, April 9 to coincide with the moment the historic meeting between Grant and Lee ended. The National Park Service and its partners invite churches, schools, public buildings, historic sites, and others to ring their bells at 3:15 p.m. (Eastern Time) for four minutes (symbolic of the four years of the Civil War).
I will be sharing more information about the Civil War in upcoming blogs. Until then….
Happy Shunpiking!
Joann
Wednesday, August 14, 2013
Confederate Rest
By Ruth A. Ringelstetter
Beginning in 2011 and continuing through 2015, many sites around the country are commemorating the Civil War and its battles. One of the most famous, the Battle of Gettysburg, was commemorated this year at the beginning of July.
On Memorial Day of this year, Joann and I decided to visit the northernmost Confederate Cemetery. We didn’t have far to drive. The cemetery, called “Confederate Rest,” lies within Forest Hill Cemetery in Madison, Wisconsin.
Wisconsin was a Union State and no battles were fought here during the Civil War. So how did this Confederate cemetery end up here?
Camp Randall, although now known for the Wisconsin Badgers football team, was originally the site of the Wisconsin State Fairgrounds. With the outbreak of the Civil War, it became a U.S. Army camp for the training and organizing of Wisconsin militia. More than 70,000 recruits were trained there.
In the spring of 1862, the camp was surprised to learn that some 1300 prisoners would be heading their way. A corner of the camp was stockaded and numerous wooden frame huts were built to house the prisoners.
The prisoners were brought to Wisconsin after the Battle of Island Number Ten, which no longer exists. It was located near what today is called the New Madrid Bend, south of Cairo, Illinois.
When the prisoners were brought to Madison, many were suffering from battle wounds, malnutrition, and various diseases. They arrived on April 20th and 24th of 1862, with many townspeople turning out at the train station to get a glimpse of their arrival. The second train of men included many who were severely ill, and over the next four weeks at least several died each day until 145 had died.
There are 140 graves at Confederate Rest that are marked by name and regiment. It is said there are also 5 unmarked graves of the unknown. The men were buried far from their homes and families in Alabama, Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Arkansas.
In 1868, Alice Waterman, a widow who had been born in Louisiana and had lived most of her life in the north, moved to Madison. She did not know any of the soldiers buried at Confederate Rest. Even so, she took a great deal of interest in the cemetery, removing weeds, improving the landscape, and placing new headboards on the graves. She did all of this at her own expense.
When Alice Waterman died in 1897, she was buried at her request in the same plot as the men whose graves she had tended, but had never known. She always referred to them as “my boys.”
The Camp Randall Memorial Arch was dedicated in 1912 and serves as the entrance to the Grand Army of the Republic Memorial Park. The arch is flanked by two statues; one an enlisted soldier, and one an officer. They have no names as they represent all of Wisconsin’s Civil War soldiers. Down the street from the arch is one of the prisoner stockades.
If you’re ever in Madison, visit Confederate Rest at Forest Hill Cemetery, the Memorial Arch, or view the single remaining stockade.
Happy Shunpiking!
Ruth
Beginning in 2011 and continuing through 2015, many sites around the country are commemorating the Civil War and its battles. One of the most famous, the Battle of Gettysburg, was commemorated this year at the beginning of July.
On Memorial Day of this year, Joann and I decided to visit the northernmost Confederate Cemetery. We didn’t have far to drive. The cemetery, called “Confederate Rest,” lies within Forest Hill Cemetery in Madison, Wisconsin.
Wisconsin was a Union State and no battles were fought here during the Civil War. So how did this Confederate cemetery end up here?
Camp Randall, although now known for the Wisconsin Badgers football team, was originally the site of the Wisconsin State Fairgrounds. With the outbreak of the Civil War, it became a U.S. Army camp for the training and organizing of Wisconsin militia. More than 70,000 recruits were trained there.
In the spring of 1862, the camp was surprised to learn that some 1300 prisoners would be heading their way. A corner of the camp was stockaded and numerous wooden frame huts were built to house the prisoners.
The prisoners were brought to Wisconsin after the Battle of Island Number Ten, which no longer exists. It was located near what today is called the New Madrid Bend, south of Cairo, Illinois.
When the prisoners were brought to Madison, many were suffering from battle wounds, malnutrition, and various diseases. They arrived on April 20th and 24th of 1862, with many townspeople turning out at the train station to get a glimpse of their arrival. The second train of men included many who were severely ill, and over the next four weeks at least several died each day until 145 had died.
There are 140 graves at Confederate Rest that are marked by name and regiment. It is said there are also 5 unmarked graves of the unknown. The men were buried far from their homes and families in Alabama, Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Arkansas.
In 1868, Alice Waterman, a widow who had been born in Louisiana and had lived most of her life in the north, moved to Madison. She did not know any of the soldiers buried at Confederate Rest. Even so, she took a great deal of interest in the cemetery, removing weeds, improving the landscape, and placing new headboards on the graves. She did all of this at her own expense.
When Alice Waterman died in 1897, she was buried at her request in the same plot as the men whose graves she had tended, but had never known. She always referred to them as “my boys.”
The Camp Randall Memorial Arch was dedicated in 1912 and serves as the entrance to the Grand Army of the Republic Memorial Park. The arch is flanked by two statues; one an enlisted soldier, and one an officer. They have no names as they represent all of Wisconsin’s Civil War soldiers. Down the street from the arch is one of the prisoner stockades.
If you’re ever in Madison, visit Confederate Rest at Forest Hill Cemetery, the Memorial Arch, or view the single remaining stockade.
Happy Shunpiking!
Ruth
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