A wonderful image of Pauline Cushman (1833-1893), the famous actress turned Union scout and spy. Here she is pictured defiant in full uniform.
Her early years were a little peripatetic, born in New Orleans but raised in Grand Rapids, Michigan, her stage debut was in Louisville, Kentucky in 1862, which was then Union occupied. During this time, she was paid by pro-Confederates in the audience to raise a toast to Jefferson Davis. She agreed to do it causing an immense uproar of approval and disapproval from the audience. It was a bold move - she was promptly fired by the theatre, but it firmly placed her as a Confederate sympathiser and, just as she’d hoped, made her privy to information which she then passed on to Union troops.
“For her first assignment, in March 1863, she proceeded to gather intelligence on local Southern sympathizers in order to find out where the Confederates were getting their information and supplies” (Fitzpatrick). Her next mission saw her pass federal lines to scout Confederate defences in central Tennessee. Against the specific instructions, she made notes and drawings of Confederate forces which she hid in her boots.
Alas, she was caught twice in 1864, brought before General Braxton, and sentenced to death. Of all things, her execution was postponed due to her (exaggerated) ill health, by which time a successful Union invasion spared her.
Like many other women active in non-traditional roles, she had an entrepreneurial streak. As early as 1865, she’d published a memoir and had embarked on a lecture tour of the nation. Taken in New York in 1864, this carte-de-visite was published just her fame was burgeoning.
Fitzpatrick, M., “Pauline Cushman, Union Spy” in Military Images, Vol. 21, No. 6 (May-June, 2000), pp.31-34.
