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Sunday, April 26, 2015

Jocelyn Green: 5 Women Spies of the Civil War


Inspiring Faith and Courage
Today we have a guest post by my buddy author Jocelyn Green on women spies of the Civil War. Jocelyn is offering a drawing for a free copy of any of her books in the fantastic Heroines Behind the Lines Series in either print or ebook edition, so be sure to leave a comment on this post to be entered! In your comment, include which edition you prefer if you win, and also your email address in the following or a similar format to avoid spam: youraccount [at] internetprovider [dot] com. And if you dont win a free copy, the first 3 books in the series are on sale through May 3 for only $2.99 in all ebook formats, and her newest release, Spy of Richmond, is only $3.99. Please help spread the word!


5 Women Spies of the Civil War
by Jocelyn Green

Hundreds of women were spies on both sides of the Civil War. Below you’ll find snapshots of five of the most famous of them.

1. Belle Boyd, spy for the Confederacy

As a 17-year-old living with her prominent slaveholding family in West Virginia, Belle Boyd was arrested for shooting a Union soldier who had broken into her family’s home and insulted her mother. After she was cleared of all charges, she charmed intelligence from Union officers, and passed it to the Confederacy.

Highly suspicious of her, Union officials sent her to live with family in Front Royal, Virginia, where she became a courier between Confederate generals Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson and P.G.T. Beauregard. Jackson credited the information she delivered with helping him win victories in the Shenandoah Valley Campaign of 1862.

Boyd was arrested three more times throughout the war, and ended up marrying the Union naval officer who once served as her captor.

2. Pauline Cushman, spy for the Union

Pauline Cushman, born in New Orleans, was a struggling 30-year-old actress in 1863. In Louisville, Kentucky, she was dared by Confederate officers to interrupt a show with a toast to the Confederacy and its president, Jefferson Davis. Seizing the opportunity, Cushman told the Union Army’s local provost marshal that the toast could be used to win trust from the Confederates in attendance. It proved to be the key that unlocked the door to her most important role as a federal spy.

In Nashville she worked with the Army of the Cumberland, gathering intelligence about Rebel operations, identifying Confederate spies, and acting as a federal courier. Confederates arrested her and sentenced her to hang, but the unexpected arrival of Union forces at Shelbyville saved her life.

3. Rose O’Neal Greenhow, spy for the Confederacy

The widow Rose O'Neal Greenhow was a Washington socialite and zealous secessionist. She began spying for the Confederacy in 1861. One of her most important messages allegedly helped Gen. P.G.T. Beauregard gather enough forces to win the First Battle of Bull Run. Though she was placed under house arrest after that, Greenhow still managed to get information to her contacts. In January 1862, she was transferred, along with her 8-year-old daughter, to Old Capitol Prison. Several months later she was deported to Baltimore, Maryland, where the Confederates welcomed her as a hero.

Confederate President Jefferson Davis sent Greenhow to Britain and France to help gain support for the Confederacy. Her journey home would be the end of her story. To quote Smithsonian.com:

In September 1864, Greenhow returned to the South aboard the Condor, a British blockade-runner, carrying $2,000 in gold. A Union gunboat pursued the ship as it neared the North Carolina shore, and it ran aground on a sandbar. Against the captain’s advice, Greenhow tried to escape in a rowboat with two other passengers. The boat capsized and she drowned, presumably weighed down by the gold she carried around her neck. Her body washed ashore the next day and was buried by the Confederates with full military honors.

4. Harriet Tubman, spy for the Union

Though most known for her role spiriting slaves North to freedom, she was recruited by Union officers to run a spy network composed of former slaves in South Carolina. She also became the first woman in the U.S. history to lead a military expedition. She not only helped Col. James Montgomery plan a night raid to free slaves from rice plantations along the Combahee River, but also on June 1, 1863, Tubman was in the lead with Montgomery as they, along with hundreds of black soldiers, snaked up the river in gunboats, avoiding mines that lurked along the waterway. When they reached the shore, they destroyed a Confederate supply depot and freed more than 750 slaves.

5. Elizabeth Van Lew, spy for the Union

Van Lew was a Richmond-born abolitionist whose sympathy for the Union, and the cause of freedom, compelled her to bring food and other comforts to the Union officers imprisoned a few blocks from her house at Libby Prison. Her loyalties were under suspicion, but her wealth and social status protected her for the most part. In December 1863, a Union officer she helped escape from Libby told General Benjamin Butler about her, suggesting she would make an excellent spy contact for the North. Butler contacted Van Lew with his request, and she agreed. She developed her own spy network and digested and synthesized the information before sending it, encoded, via a courier to Union military officials.

Van Lews spy ring included black and white Richmonders, slave and free, native Virginians and immigrants. One of these was Mary Elizabeth Bowser, a former slave who was planted as a domestic in the White House of the Confederacy.

Hundreds of women, just as daring in their deeds of espionage as these spies above, have escaped fame for their work. In Spy of Richmond, Ive chosen to explore the life of a young woman drawn into the spy network of Elizabeth Van Lew. The fictional heroine of Sophie Kent represents the real historical heroines who quietly gathered intelligence for the spymistress at great personal risk.

Belle Boyd, Pauline Cushman, Rose O'Neal Greenhow, Harriet Tubman, Elizabeth van Lew

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Compelled to atone for the sins of her slaveholding father, Union loyalist Sophie Kent risks everything to help end the war from within the Confederate capital and abolish slavery forever. But she cant do it alone.

Former slave Bella Jamison sacrifices her freedom to come to Richmond, where her Union soldier husband is imprisoned, and her twin sister still lives in bondage in Sophies home. Though it may cost them their lives, they work with Sophie to betray Rebel authorities. Harrison Caldwell, a Northern journalist who escorts Bella to Richmond, infiltrates the War Department as a clerkbut is conscripted to defend the citys fortifications.

As Sophies spy network grows, she walks a tightrope of deception, using her fathers position as newspaper editor and a suitors position in the ordnance bureau for the advantage of the Union. One misstep could land her in prison, or worse. Suspicion hounds her until she barely even trusts herself. When her espionage endangers the people she loves, she makes a life-and-death gamble.

Will she follow her convictions even though it costs her everythingand everyoneshe holds dear?

Jocelyn Green



Jocelyn Green is the award-winning author of ten fiction and nonfiction books. A former military wife, she offers encouragement and hope to military wives worldwide through her Faith Deployed books and The 5 Love Languages Military Edition, which she co-authored with best-selling author Dr. Gary Chapman. Her Heroines Behind the Lines Civil War novels, inspired by real heroines on America’s home front, are marked by their historical integrity and gritty inspiration.

Jocelyn graduated from Taylor University in Upland, Indiana, with a B.A. in English, concentration in writing. She is an active member of the Christian Authors Network, the Advanced Writers and Speakers Association, American Christian Fiction Writers, and the Military Writers Society of America.

Youll find Jocelyn’s website here.

Jocelyn Green

49 comments:

  1. I would like to win a paperback version of Widow of Gettysburg. My email address is: mysterylover93[at]yahoo[dot]com.

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    1. Widow of Gettysburg is full of history and some mystery, so I think you'd really enjoy it! Good luck!

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  2. I can't wait to read Spy of Richmond. Whether I win here or not. LOL I would prefer paperback though to fully complete my collection of the series.
    mmbbg72493(at)gmail(dot)com

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    1. Hi Meghan! I can't wait for you to read Spy of Richmond, too! Hope you love it!

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  3. I'd love to win a print copy of any of the books in the series. we3camayas[at]yahoo[dot]com.

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    1. Pamela, I love how easy to please you are! :) Hope you get a chance to try this series soon!

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  4. I would like to win a paperback copy of Wedded to War. I have copies of the others in the series but only Kindle copy of the first one. Love this series!!
    ckbarker at gmail dot com

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    1. Cheryl, that would be fun for you to have the complete series in paperback! There's something special about having them all together on the shelf. :)

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  5. I would love to win a print copy of Wedded to War so I can start my collection of these books.

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    1. BJM, I would love for you to start your collection of these books soon, too! Best wishes!

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  6. I'd love Spy of Richmond in paperback! AND, I can't wait to add your books to my reading list via Joceyln's suggestion! rkajdrew@gmail.com

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    1. Kimberly, you are going to LOVE J.M.'s books! Start with Daughter of Liberty!

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    2. Kimberly, Daughter of Liberty is the first in the series and, as Jocelyn says, the place to start. I'll have a drawing soon to lead up to the release of Valley of the Shadow. Between Jocelyn and me, you're going to learn a whole lot about the Revolution and the Civil War while being entertained at the same time, and how cool is that? lol!

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  7. I'd love to win Spy of Richmond in PB. It's the only one I lack in this series! I'm going to start them once I have all four. :) can't wait. Ewe_r_merritt(at) yahoo(dot) com

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    1. How fun! I'm excited for you to complete the collection so you can start reading them!

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  8. Ladies, I have all your names in the drawing, and wish you all the best of luck. But don't forget that even if you don't win this time, the entire series is on sale in ebook format through May 3, so you can still snag a great read--or the whole series--at a fantastic price!

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  9. Sorry for my accidental duplicate comments, everyone! The cat keeps jumping on the keyboard! LOL

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    1. Cats always HAVE to be in the middle of the action, don't they, Jocelyn? lol!

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    2. Yes!! I think this little guy is especially needy since we've been away for 8 days and just got home late Saturday night. :)

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  10. I would like to have a print copy of "Yankee in Atlanta." Have loved the previous two books and hope to read the last one very soon as well. Thanks for this chance to win a copy!

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    1. Laura, so glad you loved Wedded and Widow! Hope you get a chance to continue reading the series soon. If you remember Ruby O'Flannery, the Irish immigrant from Wedded to War, you'll be happy to know her story continues in Yankee in Atlanta.

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  11. Oops, forgot to include my e-mail address, sorry about that. drumb at att dot net

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    1. Perfectly all right, Laura. Glad you added it. :-)

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  12. I guess I didn't understand the instructions so I will post again.
    cheryl [dot] brunsting [at] gmail [dot] com

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    1. And my comment about the books went into cyber-space too. I would love to receive the book "Spy of Richmond" in print as it is the only one I haven't read. I was amazed at the number of roles women played in the Civil War. In addition to "keeping the home fires burning" , raising children, tending farms, keeping animals, and in some cases, taking care of elderly parents, they became nurses, grave diggers, spies, and sometimes soldiers. I cannot imagine living as they were forced to live. Until I discovered this series, I had no idea how much we owe to these brave women. Well done, Jocelyn!

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    2. Got your info down, Cheryl. Thank you!

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    3. Cheryl, I'm thrilled you learned so much about women's roles during the Civil War through this series! It's just fascinating, isn't it? With Spy of Richmond, you'll add another major role to your list: espionage. :)

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  13. I would like to win Yankee in Atlanta as a paperback please. griperang at embarqmail dot com

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    1. Hi Angela! So glad you popped over to enter the drawing! Best wishes!

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  14. Ohhh, would love to win "Yankee in Atlanta". I have read some of Jocelyn's books and really enjoy them.

    Thank you for the chance.

    wfnren@aol.com

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    1. Wendy, best of luck to you! I hope you get to continue the series with Yankee in Atlanta soon!

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  15. Laura, Cheryl, Angela, and Wendy, thank you for dropping by and entering the drawing. You're added to the list. Good luck!

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  17. Thanks for this opportunity! I would like to win a copy of the paperback version of Wedded to War. Two years ago I came across Wedded to War at my local library. I couldn't put it down! Since then I have bought and read the subsequent books in the series (including the latest- Spy of Richmond). Every book in the series is excellent, but my favorite character will always be Charlotte Waverly from Wedded to War. Her spunk and tenacity is unbeatable! I was sad to read that Spy of Richmond will be the final book in the series, but I know all good earthly things must come to an end. I am delighted to learn about the American Patriot series. I look forward to reading Daughter of Liberty! Blessings! ahenry21@wi.rr.com

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    1. Hi Ann! I'm delighted you loved Charlotte so much! Out of all the heroines I've written, Charlotte was based most closely on a real person, Georgeanna Woolsey. If you ever want to look up Georgeanna, I'm sure you'd love her too. :)

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    2. Ann, got you down for the drawing. BTW, book 5 of my series, Valley of the Shadow, releases September 1, so this is a great time to get caught up with my series too. I'm also always looking for great historical reads. Gotta have my fix! lol!

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  18. Oh this entire series sounds amazing!!! I'd love to win a copy of Wedded to War in paperback, alander87@allcom.net! Thanks!

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    1. Abby, thank you! Best wishes in the drawing! I see you'd prefer a paperback copy, but if you do have an ereader, remember that the ebooks are all discounted to just a few dollars this week. Thanks so much for stopping by!

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  19. I just finished Spy of Richmond for a book club. Now I need to read the rest of the series. I would like to win Wedded to War in paperback. I'm old school. Still don't have an e reader :) Always glad to learn about more historical fiction. kathleenschmidt@yahoo.com

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    1. Kathleen, that's wonderful that you read Spy for book club! Thank you for that! Best wishes as you start reading the rest of the series.

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  20. Ann and Kathleen, got you listed too. :-)

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  21. I LOVE such stories of true historical people! And would love to be entered to win. I prefer the paperback but kindle is delightful as well. :) My email is: elainemariecooper (at) yahoo (dot) com. Thanks, Joan!

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    1. Elaine, I am the same way, I love learning about real history and real people while I'm being entertained with a novel. :) Best wishes!

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  22. I'm with you both--love historical fiction! Got you down, Elaine. :-)

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